Darcy's Other Life
by writerfan2013
Summary: This started in answer to a challenge about alter egos for well known characters. What if Darcy were secretly an early nineteenth century crimefighter...? Chapter 19 - the wife trader. Apologies for the long delays between updates! And thank you to all the reviewers, including guests (to whom I cannot reply) for your lovely comments. -Sef
1. Chapter 1

"Madam, you must excuse me."

Darcy bowed to his dance partner, turned on his heel and strode away, pulling at his cravat as his did so. His guests thronged back into the ballroom where music still played. The wine and card tables would keep them occupied whilst he was absent.

Darcy reached the top of the stairs, his coat and cravat already off and in his hand. He called to his valet for the dark clothes he wore at these times. "Quick, man! The family needs help at this instant!" He pulled on an enveloping dark shirt: no touch of brass or gold thread to catch a lantern's light, no darts or vents to  
give away his form. "Good. My horse is saddled?"

In the stables he patted his horse reassuringly before mounting. The animal always picked up on his adrenaline and it was best to remain calm, unhurried. Haste cost lives.

They reached the crossroads swiftly. The robber had fled, and the family were still in their carriage, sobbing. Darcy briskly enquired about injuries – none – and sought the direction in which the thief had gone. Remounting he nudged the  
horse to a gallop through the trees.

He caught up with the robber in a clearing, counting his gold, and springing from the horse overpowered him with a practised tackle. "You dog. Hand over that gold."

"Stop, both of you." A gruff voice sounded and Darcy looked up to see a pistol at his head. A figure draped in black, even as he was, stood squarely in his way. "Do even thieves rob each other now? I will shoot you both."

"I'm no thief! I return this gold to its owners in the carriage." Darcy darted forward and swiped the pistol aside, sending the veiled figure staggering. "Save your weapons for this scoundrel whom I have already apprehended."

Together he and the newcomer bound the robber to a tree to await the sheriff. Darcy went to retrieve his skittish horse.

As he held the animal's reins, comforting it, he looked more closely at the slender figure beside him. "Your voice... you are no man. Can a woman be patrolling these forest roads even as I do?"

The figure shook its head and began to move away, but Darcy grasped the veil and pulled it aside.

They stood staring at each other, gasping for breath.

"No," breathed Darcy. "It cannot be...Elizabeth?"


	2. Chapter 2

The ball continued but Darcy could not concentrate on it. He stood with a group of his Cambridge acquaintances, allowing them to lead the conversation as local girls and their swains danced a quadrille. He took a drink, but it did him no good.

His eye was drawn ever back to where the Bennett family stood.

The mother, insufferably coarse. The father, modest enough but trampled by his womenfolk. And the daughters - Jane Bennett was the only one worth a second glance, and that only to see if her demure composure had been shattered by the squawking of her siblings. She was beautiful - they each had quite fine complexions - but the sly simpering wearied Darcy.

But the second daughter held a new fascination for him. Elizabeth Bennett. Unlucky in her relations, unluckier still in being unlikely to inherit even a fifth of her father's property, unblessed by her sister's good looks - nonetheless she had captured his attention. Could she really be engaged in so unfeminine a project as to rid the roads of the bandits which had multiplied of late?

He was repulsed to think that he had invited such a creature into his home.

A gentleman's daughter wielding a weapon! Riding astride, alone in the dead of night, tackling the cut-throats who terrorised this forest...

She stood with her sisters, eyes cast down, pale gown perfectly adjusted to her form, lips in a slight smile at some remark of her father's.

Darcy's eyes narrowed. She observed him from beneath her lashes. She, a guest in his house, had the temerity to seek him out him with her gaze after he had discovered her!

He could stand it no longer. Setting his glass aside he crossed the room.

"Madam. I would speak with you."

He ignored the squeals from her younger sisters.

Elizabeth Bennett looked up and met his gaze quite coolly. He saw no shred of womanly shame for how he had unveiled her before. Her dark eyes held a challenge.

And even as he began to speak, his words fell away, and he said instead, "I beg the pleasure of this dance."

For the first time, she faltered. Then she lifted her chin and replied, "Of course. You find me quite disarmed."

Darcy offered her his arm, struck by her slender figure beside his own, and muttered, "I doubt that very much, Miss Bennett."

At which she only smiled, and in that instant, he was lost.


	3. Chapter 3

He rose early and with his man Bryant rode to the clearing where he had bound the robber to the tree. Gone, of course, freed by his criminal friends long before justice could be served.

"At least the gold went back to its owners," Darcy said. Bryant grunted. A man of few words, trusted by Darcy for his discretion and his disinclination to waste time. "I will find the robber's identity and have him bound over to the magistrate. I saw his face clearly. He will be known in these parts."

He did not mention Miss Bennett. In truth he did not know how.

"Will you ride out again tonight, sir?" Bryant asked as they trotted back into the stableyard.

Darcy shook his head. "I have business matters to attend to this morning, and then I must call on certain persons of the village. I'll need you with me, Bryant - to corroborate anything that we discover. But no night ride for me this evening. The scoundrels would expect it."

After a dull morning writing promissory notes for the building work he had commissioned for the far south corner of the estate, Darcy was ready to escape. He donned his coat and silk hat, and called for his carriage. "A few extra baskets today, I think, Mrs Caskill."

"Very good, sir." The housekeeper obeyed him instantly. Everybody did.

The carriage was loaded. Darcy sat within and Bryant without. Both men watched keenly as they passed through Pemberley's grounds into the forest.

Darcy called first on his tenants: handing out baskets of fresh poultry and cheese from his own butchery and dairy, he asked after their health, their children and their work. The children in question invariably cavorted around the carriage wheels or tugged at Darcy's coat tails until he play-cuffed them away. Bryant looked over the proprties with Darcy and noted down any repair work which was needed.

"You are kind, Sir," said one mother, curtseying. "Nor every master would take such trouble."

"It is all for my own benefit," Darcy replied with a slight smile. "With a full belly and a mended roof, you can sleep better and work harder."

The man of the house nodded grimly. "Aye, and keep watch better too, now this gang is round about."

"What's this?" asked Bryant, ready with his note paper.

The man described how a group of ill favoured men had been seen in the village lately, and how just at that time chickens and lambs had gone missing. "And small items of jewellery, too, that the inn keeper's lady had for her wedding, and the parson's lady too, has mislaid a very precious ring."

"And all this on my land," Darcy said to Bryant with a hard face. "Tell me more of these men. What were their faces?"

By the time he had spoken to each tenant and the poor of the village, Darcy already had a strong picture of the leading rogue at the heart of this outbreak of thievery.

The parson -a thin, nervous man with a wife still more elderly than himself and a delicate, half sickly grownup son - confirmed the stories.

"A tall man with a handsome but dirty face leads them. He was seen first at the inn, renting rooms for which they never paid. The four of them left before dawn, taking sundry valuables with them. Other guests were left without the means to pay the innkeeper, and so everyone is left unhappy." The parson quavered at his cup of tea.

Darcy stood, strode about the room, placed his own teacup on the mantel. "What names did they give?"

"Tolfrey," said the parson's wife. She coughed into a lace edged handkerchief. "They claimed to be men of trade, on their way to the great market at Nottingham. But they had no goods with them and they did not appear respectable."

Darcy frowned. "The Goose Fair. A market of gypsies and travelling people. A place where honour, gold and even wives are bartered away."

"They took my ruby ring," said the parson's wife. "Broke in our back door and took the ring right from our strongbox as we lay upstairs. I told Ned to go and look what the noises were, but he was afraid."

"Edward, you must fetch your parents a new strongbox," Darcy commanded, handing the shamefaced son a card. "Use my own man, his work is without equal. And sleep with a pistol close at hand from now on. If these scoundrels are so desperate as to enter good people's homes while they sleep, who knows but that they may cut throats too."

The parson and his family gasped and clutched at each other.

"What of these others with Tolfrey," Bryant asked then. "Were the four of them like? Could they be brothers?"

"The inn keeper did not see them all. He spoke only to this Tolfrey. The second man was very florid as if from drink, and dirty. The other two were smaller, seemingly younger, and did not speak. They all kept their cloaks close round their faces as if they feared being known."

Darcy thanked them, and left a few coins for the chapel poor plate, along with a basket laden with sweetmeats from Pemberley's kitchen.

"These people have been cruelly used," he told Bryant as they returned to the carriage. "I will not stand for it. I will walk into the village. Go you now back to the house, and return with both our horses - we will ride over to the magistrate and see if a small force of men can be assembled to patrol the village tonight. And we can tell him to make room in the gaol on the bridge, for it will soon be full of blackguards."

Darcy strolled from the parsonage along the lane and to the river, crossing the very bridge in question. It was a hump backed bridge of stone, a hundred years old, with a small domed building at its apex. What visitors took for a toll booth, locals knew as a lockup, rarely used, where the sheriff could hold vagrants or thieves until the magistrate could collect them for the ships. Darcy peered through the tiny slot in the stout wooden door. A filthy stone floor, slimy walls and a stench of carrion. Perfect for the bandits who threatened the villagers and his own tenants.

"Good afternoon, Mr Darcy," came a voice from below. "Are you planning on vacating Pemberley in favour of a more modestly sized property?"

Darcy stepped smartly away from the tiny gaol and peered over the bridge's parapet.

On the river's edge a clutch of girls were barefoot in the fast flowing water, their skirts hitched carelessly about their ankles, gathering cress in shallow trugs. Supervising from the shore and laughing up at him was Elizabeth Bennett.


	4. Chapter 4

Darcy 4

Darcy made his bow to Elizabeth Bennett and she returned his courtesy. Straightening, he noticed the barefoot girls giggling and nudging each other. A blush rose to Elizabeth's face and she stepped away from the girls, murmuring something to them.

The blush aroused Darcy's suspicions and he looked more closely at the cress gathering girls. The taller of them, hair severely tied back and squinting as if with poor eyesight; the smallest, with the squeakiest giggle and a rather sweet chubby face; the middle one, with the loudest laugh, womanly figure despite her youth, and a bold eye…with a shock Darcy recognised them. The half clad young women he had taken as farm girls being supervised by Miss Bennett were, in fact, her younger sisters.

Elizabeth Bennett climbed to the side of the road as Darcy descended the bridge to meet her. "Yes, Mr Darcy," she said as they met, "my sisters are working in the stream. The watercress here is excellent, and freely available, whereas income, I regret to say, is not." She glanced up at him. "You think this is shameful."

"Poverty is not shameful," he said shortly. The appearance of a gentleman's daughters bare legged in public, however, was another matter. But even as he sought for a way to express this he had an idea. "Miss Bennett, may I speak with you on a delicate matter?"

"More delicate even than my family's financial distress, which you have just now dismissed with a frown? Certainly" She fell into step with him as they made towards the village.

"It concerns that rogue that we… that was captured last night. He escaped."

A scowl passed fleetingly across Elizabeth's face, then was gone. "Can he be caught again?"

"Not on the roads, not tonight. He will be cautious, so soon after his …misadventure. No – my plan is to lure him to a location which favours his capture. Miss Bennett, do you still… does your father still keep staff?"

She lowered her eyes. "Our housekeeper, and our old nurse who is too frail and too dear to leave us. All the others have gone to find employment where the pay is more reliable."

"And the young misses more respectable," Darcy said, then regretted it as her face flamed. "Forgive me – it was an ungallant remark. I have never known straitened circumstances."

"May you never then," she said bitterly. "For you are too old to learn how to gather cress, or darn your own socks."

Darcy bowed in acknowledgment of this truth. "But perhaps your housekeeper visits the village, perhaps she is friendly with others who work in service in this area?" Elezabeth nodded. "I wonder, then, if you could assist me. Can you let it be known to your housekeepr that a newly arrived guest at the Lodge at Pemberly, has in his possession a most valuable watch, and sundry other items of easy portability and great worth?"

Her eyes gleamed. "You would draw the thief to the Lodge and corner him there?"

"Yes. I believe I know his identity – one Tolfrey."

Was it his imagination or did she falter a little at the mention of this name?

Darcy continued. "If Tolfrey and his band of accomplices attempt to break into the Lodge, they will find me waiting – with the magistrate's men, armed and prepared to take them directly to the gaol. After that, the noose."

She stopped and turned to face him. "Tonight?"

"On any night," Darcy said. "As you alluded, I am a gentleman with no obligation to work. I have leisure to spend my time waiting in a gatehouse, playing cards with the lodgekeeper and a selection of my acquaintance from the county magistrate, and …"he waved a hand expansively – "…and perhaps my gamekeeper and all his rifles."

Elizabeth walked on, talking as if to herself. "There is no time to get word out tonight…perhaps if I mentioned it myself in the village now…Yes." She smiled up at him – but it was a shallow smile of false brightness. "A good notion, Mr Darcy. I am happy to assist and I wish you luck in this endeavour."

"Thank you. Let us then part here and attend to our tasks. I am pleased to have met with you, knowing that this matter was so … important to you." It was no good. He could not bring himself to refer to her reckless outing dressed in black and brandishing a pistol of her own.

"It is more dear to me than you could know," she replied, and this time her smile was a little saddened. he preferred it to her artificial smile, though he could not fathom the reason for it. Perhaps she was ashamed of her escapade after all, realising the dishonour it drew to herself and her family.

He resolved never to mention it again. If Tolfrey was stopped, then Miss Bennett would have no need to roam the midnight forest, and Darcy would be able to admit her to his acquaintance after all.

He crushed the thought as it arose. The Bennetts were not for him. Not one of them was worthy of his notice, however bold, or brave, or…beautiful.

"Good day then, Mr Darcy," Elizabeth said, breaking into his thoughts with an amused smile which was more like her usual demeanour.

He recollected himself. "Good day."

A clatter of hooves behind him announced Bryant, with both their horses. Darcy mounted, tipped his hat to Miss Bennett, and galloped away, leaving her standing in the road looking after him.


	5. Chapter 5

How the hours dragged. Darcy paced the small lodge, caring not that he inconvenienced everyone else by so doing.

"He will come tonight. He will."

"He may be gone from the region, Sir," suggested Bryant.

"No. The pickings are too rich. He will see the Lodge as the first step to stealing from Pemberley itself." Darcy spun on his heel yet again, and paced back.

He pulled from his coat pocket the letter which had arrived with the London coach. His great friend Bingley would be joining him at Pemberley that week, bringing his sister for a long visit. This would curtail further attempts at apprehending Tolfrey and his gang. But it would also present the opportunity to assess Caroline Bingley as a marriage prospect. Darcy had heard of her great elegance and accomplishments, and Bingley enthused about his sister's beauty.

Yes - catch this gang and then set aside the pistols for a time. Darcy must marry, and Georgiana needed a sister, and all would be as everyone expected.

The magistrate was chafing at the tedium. "Shall we regroup tomorrow, sir?" he suggested.

Before Darcy could speak there was the sound of hooves on the gravel drive. The men sprang up. Darcy motioned for silence.

They waited, weapons ready, as the horse approached the house. Darcy, listening closely, was puzzled. "That's no hunter," he murmured to Bryant. "That's a cob at best. Or even a pony." Bryant nodded his agreement.

The horse was joined by another, and another. Sounds of dismount followed, then footsteps round the lodge to the back door.

No lights shone within; the lodgekeeper's family were upstairs in bed in the dark with instructions not to stir. All had to appear as a house at slumber, with their newly acquired jewels ready for the taking.

A crash and the sound of breaking glass at the back window. Darcy led the men into the passage as the back door swung open.

"Capture them!" he bellowed as dark figures crept into the room.

A man's voice gave a foul curse, and a woman shrieked. Darcy rushed for the lead figure but in the narrow passage the man wriggled from his grasp and ran free, calling to his fellows, "Flee! We are expected! Flee!"

Out of the lodge they ran, Darcy calling, "We are armed and will fire! Stop thief!"

He shouted for lanterns and the magistrates's men fumbled to bring light.

While they struck tinder, Darcy ran into the drive. Three horses, the first sprinting into the open forest opposite the lodge. The second two, dark outlines against the midnight sky, were smaller and their riders struggling to mount.

"Sir!" Bryant thrust a carriage lamp into his hand.

Darcy raised it up and saw the second horse galloping away. But the third was halted, head down, refusing the kicks of its desperate rider. Bryant took the lamp as Darcy sprang for the thief.

As he reached the horse's head, the animal shied, and Darcy leapt aside to avoid the flying hooves. It was only a pony as he'd thought, and not a young one. The rider kicked the beast's sides but Darcy had hold. As the pony was urged away Darcy grasped the bridle and swung up onto the saddle behind the thief, grasping him firmly round the waist.

"Tolfrey is away, sir!" cried Bryant. The magistrates's men were fanning out into the trees with lights and dogs.

"I have this one!" Darcy returned - but he spoke too soon. The pony, alarmed at the sudden extra weight, bolted along the lane, leaving the would be captors far behind - and Darcy clinging perilously to its head.

The thief let out a high pitched shriek and Darcy realised he was only a boy. "Give me the reins, lad -let me have them or we'll both be killed."

Whether through stubbornness or fright, the boy clung fast to the reins. Darcy wrestled with the pony's head and finally brought it to a trot, and then a walk.

They were under the trees with no light. "Lucky not to have lost our heads to a branch," Darcy muttered. But there was little else to be grateful for. The lights and cries of the magistrates's men were nowhere to be made out, and he was alone with a thief and housebreaker.

He walked the trembling pony to a halt, and said shortly, "Dismount, lad, and remember that I am armed." The thief obeyed, shrinking away from Darcy. "Don't try to run, I am larger and faster, and gunshot spreads broad."

"You cannot even see me to shoot at in the dark," the boy said with a touch of bravado, but recoiled whimpering as Darcy gripped his hooded neck.

"Release him, sir! I vouch for him!"

An imperious voice rang out through the trees. Light, rapid hoof sounds approached.

A stout, panting pony, its rider holding aloft a wavering lantern, came up to them.

Darcy held the boy, his jaw set. He had recognised the voice, and here she was, wrapped in a pale cloak and seated as a lady on a lady's gentle horse. Interfering again in men's business, and dangerous business too.

"Mr magistrate...I beg you, do not harm him. He had no part in the planning of this vicious crime." Elizabeth's voice was shrill but clear.

"Why do you defend him, Miss Bennett?" Darcy asked acidly, letting her light fall on his face.

Elizabeth drew back in shock. "Mr Darcy!"

"I hardly think you are surprised to find me here," he said. "And in what way can you possibly vouch for this thief? What is he to you?"

His mind rang with dreadful possibilities, and Darcy flung the thief to the ground. He let out a scream and collapsed.

Elizabeth screamed too and jumped to the ground. She ran to the boy and drew back his hood, crying, "Kitty, Kitty, can you speak?"

"What fresh madness is this?" cried Darcy. He snatched the lantern from Elizabeth and shone it on the boy... Who was no boy, but a very young woman with her faced smeared in dirt.

"My sister," Elizabeth said quickly. "Do you not see, Mr Darcy? I wanted to catch Tolfrey myself, to stop him before you discovered him... Because I had to try to stop... My sisters."


	6. Chapter 6

Darcy patted Elizabeth Bennett's hack reassuringly. "Not far now." The horse shook its mane miserably.

Miss Bennett and her sister Kitty were on Kitty's pony. "The rendezvous is at the old charcoal burner's hut," Kitty had told them. "If the plan went awry, we were to meet there."

"And how exactly was it to go anything but awry, with two foolish girls out on horseback in the dead of night, following that scoundrel into a house breaking ?" Elizabeth demanded.

Kitty's voice was petulant. "Tolfrey is much maligned by you and Jane. It is not his fault he has fallen on hard times. Like us," she added.

"We fulfill our obligations without recourse to crime," Elizabeth returned in a furious whisper. "And we do not put about our troubles in front of strangers."

"Mr Darcy is not a stranger! We have been to his ball. And Mama says he will marry you or Jane if we can keep up the acquaintance."

"Kitty! Hush!"

"Will this Tolfrey be at the rendezvous?" Darcy enquired, affecting not to have heard this last.

"Will you shoot him if he is? Oh, Mary will be sorry to miss it! She loves a duel story, and she is not so fond of Tolfrey as Lydia and I am."

"Miss Kitty Bennett," said Darcy. losing patience, "are you older than ten?"

"I am sixteen, said Kitty with pride.

"Then most likely you are for the noose. Please remain silent until we reach this meeting point. The magistrate's men still roam these woods."

"Surely we could tell them you were accompanying us home, that we were lost out on horseback in the woods..." Elizabeth at least had been subdued by Darcy's mention of the gallows.

"Were I a less honest man, I might," said Darcy. "But in any case they would recognise your sister's horse."

They rode on in silence.

The cottage was reached, and Lydia Bennett found inside, sobbing noisily. She had not even had the sense to secure her horse, and he had wandered off.

Her tears turned to joy when she saw her sisters -and then she frowned, seeing Darcy. "Why have you brought that horrid man with you? He looks down on everyone who is not as wealthy as he is."

Elizabeth placed her lantern on the earth floor, where it flickered and cast looming shadows. "Mr Darcy has helped me find you," she said evenly.

"Oh you are so dull!" cried Lydia. "We were doing splendidly before you began interfering. This must be down to you, Lizzie - have you fallen in love with him?" She giggled piercingly as Elizabeth blushed and Darcy scowled.

"We will rest here," he announced in a tone which brooked no argument, "and then make our way to Pemberley. My man will send word to your parents that you are safe, having lost your way in a foolish attempt to join the capture of the criminal gang. The horses will remain at Pemberley until they have been fed up such that no one would know them, for they are thin enough now, wretched beasts. You will all be sent home tomorrow morning."

Lydia poured and Kitty stayed sullenly silent.

"Thank you. Mr Darcy," said Elizabeth. "We are most grateful."

"This is not yet over," Darcy said grimly to her as the two younger girls hugged each other and whispered.. "Tolfrey must be caught and all his accomplices dealt with. Remember, Miss Bennett - I will not tolerate criminals or law breaking. The gender of the criminal does not guarantee her safety."

Tears started in Elizabeth's eyes. "I understand," she said brokenly, inclining her head.

Darcy looked at her for a long moment - pale, ragged and dirty from the chase through the trees to save her ungrateful sisters - and spoke more softly, for her ear alone. "We must form a plan to save your family," he said. "But you must be honest with me from now on or I cannot help you."

Elizabeth grasped his gloved hand and kissed it gratefully. She did not speak, but gripped his fingers and met his gaze. They nodded at each other.

"Come," said Darcy. "We must go."

He took Elizabeth's arm and led the women back into the night.


	7. Chapter 7

Darcy woke early, stirred by the recollection that Elizabeth Bennett was in his house. He sent his housekeeper to make sure that she, and her sisters, had everything they required, and to his sister Georgiana to ask her to keep to her room until sent for. He had no explanation that he was prepared to give her- better then to keep her separate from all Bennetts. He then descended to the breakfast room.

It was a cosy room overlooking the rose garden. It had been his mother's favourite spot, and now Georgiana liked it as much. Darcy took coffee and toast, and sent hot chocolate up to Georgiana.

A soft "Good morning," made him start. Elizabeth Bennett had entered and was hesitating by the side table. Darcy gestured for her to help herself. Soon they were both seated at the family table, looking out at the roses.

"How do you know Tolfrey?" Darcy asked. He made no attempt at preamble. They were beyond that.

Elizabeth sighed. She looked tired this morning, but the pale blue gown of Georgiana's showed off her cream complexion to its best advantage. And, Darcy admitted, in his opinion Elizabeth Bennett would look well in any colour under the sun, or in rags.

"Tolfrey is a former soldier. He came to our house some weeks back. pleading kinship. While my father wrote letters to our supposed mutual cousin, Tolfrey stayed. He behaved as one of the family and some of us - that is, we took him at his word. He is somewhat handsome and my younger sisters were charmed by his attentions."

She put down her teacup and rose from the table to pace about the room. Darcy stood too and leaned an arm on the mantel as she walked.

"By the time the letter from our cousin returned, revealing Tolfrey as a stranger, he had already lost interest in us. It must have been very clear that we were not wealthy, not even wealthy enough to rob. He dropped his attentions to Jane most suddenly and cruelly, and I do not think I have seen her smile sincerely since. As he left, even then her kind nature prompted her to give him a ring of her own so that he would not be destitute having left his regiment.  
"We thought that was the end of it - that we had been taken in by a deceitful rogue, bit that we could now carry on as before. But after Tolfrey left, I discovered letters written to Lydia - dreadful letters. Mr Darcy, you asked that I be honest, and so I shall be. They were love letters - written from a charlatan to a young and most susceptible girl, who, thinking herself in love with him. agreed to help him in his treacherous plan." Her voice broke.

Darcy stepped to Elizabeth and silently offered her his handkerchief. She took it and pressed it to the corner of her eyes.

"This.. wretch - used Lydia -and Kitty - to discover which of our acquaintance was richest, was most worth robbing. And the stupid, stupid girls, their heads full of novels, imagined Tolfrey a romantic Dick Turpin figure and themselves his paramours..." Elizabeth flung her hands out on frustration. "Neither Jane nor I could persuade them from their plan to accompany him on one of his adventures. I believe they acted only as lookouts. but they returned with small tokens... gold rings... showing they had profited from the escapade."

Darcy flinched. "This is shocking indeed," he muttered. "I am no longer certain they can be saved."

"There is yet more. Kitty had forged a plan for the whole family to go abroad, to live more cheaply in an area where we were not known, and could keep a very modest house without shame. She had thought America or the Indies. The money to take us there... would come from these ... terrible deeds.

"I persuaded our father to come away, shut up the house and move to this village. I hoped to separate Lydia and Kitty from this insidious influence. But they managed to contact Tolfrey and he, in company with some other disgraced soldiers, followed us here. Seeing Pemberley, with all its prosperity, it was only a matter of time before he began to steal again. That is why you found me on the roads that night, Mr Darcy, with a pistol in my hand. I brought this terror to your village, your lands, and I must do my utmost to stop it."

She stopped, and sank onto the rose patterned sofa. Darcy saw his handkerchief, now twisted round and round in her hands and moist with tears.

Elizabeth went on. "We had hoped -Jane and I - that in a new place, with Tolfrey gone, we could begin again. Tolfrey used my sister most cruelly. Mr Darcy. He courted her, believing us to be wealthy, and in turn led us to think that he had connections, and money coming to him. When he found the truth, he dropped Jane without a word."

And preyed instead on your youngest sister, Darcy thought. He had his own thoughts on men who took advantage of foolish young girls. But he said nothing.

"Jane's heart was broken " Elizabeth continued. "When we came here, we thought that our only hope was if one of us could marry, and save the rest from poverty...from shame. Jane has the most beauty, and we hoped that she might make a good match. But now..." Her voice trailed off.

Darcy paced the room. "My first concern must be to apprehend this scoundrel and recover what goods we can from his crimes. Once he is under lock and key will be the time to consider how best to proceed with regards to your sisters. I myself witnessed them fleeing the scene of a crime. At this moment I do not know how to reconcile this with your plea for merciful treatment of them."

"I make no plea, sir,"she said then. looking up. "These are the facts. I conceal nothing. I favour no part of the story. And you know the truth of my part in it."

Darcy nodded. "I will not perjure myself. Yet careful recollection of the events may show them in another light. For example:

"Miss Bennett. Did your sisters partake in the crimes themselves? Or were the treasures tokens from a man they considered their suitor?"

He spoke deliberately, and Elizabeth caught his meaning at once. "Each girl believed herself in love and that he returned her affections." She too spoke with careful meaning. He admired her quick wittedness.

"That is something." Darcy began to speak again, as the plan formed in his mind. But he was interrupted by Bryant. "What is it?"

"Sorry to intrude, sir. But there is a smart carriage on the lower drive, full of people. And a young woman on horseback has just put in at the stable."

Darcy went out onto the terrace with Elizabeth close behind, to peer out over the grounds.

It was indeed a very neat equipage on the far drive, and one he knew well. He raised a hand in greeting and the gentleman riding beside the carriage waved back.

"It is my friend Bingley and his party, arrived some days early,"Darcy said. An awkward turn of events, allowing him little time to resolve these other issues.

Bingley spurred his horse and cantered up to the terrace wall, calling a jovial greeting to Darcy.

But Elizabeth was not listening. She cried out as a modestly dressed young woman approached through the rose garden just as Bingley dismounted and stepped in to hail his friend. Bingley looked on in surprise as Elizabeth embraced her.

"Oh Jane," said Elizabeth. "I'm so glad to see you."


	8. Chapter 8

"Mr Darcy, this is utterly charming. We see you in your natural setting at Pemberley -a place I have longed to see this past year! -and in company too."

Miss Bingley swept about the room, her finely ruched skirts rustling. "And such unusual company. Tell me again, Miss Bennett, about your sudden move to Pemberley?"

She stopped abruptly in front of Jane and laid a hand affectionately on her shoulder. "Come Miss Bennett! Take a turn with me and let us become acquainted."

Jane did not move.

"My sisters and I were on the point of leaving as you arrived, Miss Bingley," Elizabeth said. Darcy caught her concerned look at her sister.

"We would not intrude on your visit to your friends," Jane added. She smiled faintly at Mr Darcy and Mr Bingley.

"Oh shame! But perhaps there will be other times. Charles, you promised you would show me the marvellous orangery here."

"And so I will, Caroline. But let us get our breath back first. We have hardly been under Darcy's roof ten minutes and you are wanting the tour. And we must extend these ladies a proper farewell."

Jane rose. Bingley and Darcy stood too and bowed. "If your carriage is available, Mr Darcy-?"

"As I promised " Darcy said. He nodded to Bryant, waiting near the door and he disappeared to make all ready.

"Oh, there are more of you!" Caroline Bingley raised her eyebrows as Kitty entered, eyes downcast.

"My younger sister, Kitty, " said Jane in a low voice.

"You are quite spoiled, Mr Darcy, with so many unmarried young ladies in the house. How you can fix your attention on anything with such charms all about you I do not know." Caroline Bingley let put a tinkling laugh.

"I find I am able to manage," Darcy said.

Elizabeth spoke. "Mr Darcy concentrates his mind on higher things. He is not to be distracted by ladies or charms."

She spoke lightly, pleasantly, yet there was an edge.

Darcy glanced at her.

"Then I must make it my business to demonstrate female accomplishments to him. Perhaps, living in isolation as a bachelor, Mr Darcy has had infrequent exposure to the company of young ladies."

She spoke with an emphasis which excluded all others present from this category.

"Mr Darcy is in frequent company with Miss Darcy, who must be considered a young lady, even though she is very young," returned Elizabeth with a smile.

"Mr Darcy is still in the room," said Darcy, "and starting to feel unnecessary to this conversation. Come. Let me escort you to my carriage. Miss Bennett - Miss Elizabeth Bennettt -"

He held out his arm to Jane, but Bingley was too quick, claiming Jane and Kitty's arms to himself. Darcy looked at Elizabeth.

She took his arm without speaking. Soon they were in the carriage, and Darcy sent the servant back to hasten Lydia.

Darcy leaned into the carriage to wish them farewell. Then speaking just for Elizabeth's hearing, he added, "I will write to you on this other matter. Where I can, I will help you."

She blinked at him, her eyes bright with tears. "How can we ever thank you," she began, and then stopped.

Bryant was sprinting from the house, coat tails flying. He held papers.

Darcy stepped back to take the letter, but Bryant passed it in to Jane Bennett. She took it with a puzzled smile, then clapped a hand to her mouth as she read.

"Jane - what is it - what's wrong?"

Elizabeth clutched at the letter as it slid to the floor. Jane slumped backward. "Mr Darcy! My sister has swooned!"

Bingley flung open the carriage door and caught Jane in his arms. "We must get her to the house," he said. "Caroline - fetch your smelling salts."

Elizabeth hurried after him with Kitty, one hand gathering her skirts, the other gripping the letter. She read as she ran, stumbled and cried out.

Darcy grasped her elbow as she plunged towards the ground, hissing, "What is it? Your parents - is it bad news?"

Elizabeth was pale. Still doubled over on the ground, she glanced about. The Bingleys were not near. "The worst news," she said, her breath coming in gasps. Darcy took her hands and raised her to her feet. Elizabeth took a breath and said, "It is from my sister Lydia. She has fled this house in the night, and she has gone to Tolfrey."


	9. Chapter 9

"She cannot have gone far."

"The dairy horse is missing, sir."

"Trust Lydia to pick an inappropriate mount when my father's good horse is here," said Elizabeth. "But this time this will be to our advantage."

Jane was on the sofa in the breakfast room, being tended by a female servant and a sobbing Kitty. "Please don't trouble Mr Darcy with our private business, she said. He has done enough for us."

"Mr Darcy has offered to help," Elizabeth said, "and we need help."

"But our father ought to- "

"Jane. We have kept so much from our father, knowing his ... flaws. We cannot hide this dreadful news from him, but if there is an honest offer of help then my opinion is that we should take it."

She spoke like a man, Darcy thought: clear, decisive, with ideas to offer. Yet there was feminine sensibility there too. As a rule he disliked women who passed constant comment, but he realised that this was where the female concerned had not knowledge of the matters under discusion; Elizabeth had experience.

"I am happy to assist," Darcy said then. "I will take Bingley and ride out, this minute."

"No," said Elizabeth. "Mr Bingley need not become entangled with this sorry business. I will go with you."

"Lizzie! You should not be seen out riding alone with a gentleman."

"Jane, the time for propriety is past."

"No," said Darcy. "I agree with Miss Bennett. Given the seriousness of the situation. you should not place yourselves in any more exposed position than you must."

"Then please ready the carriage again, and when I reach home, I will ride from there."

Elizabeth stared at Darcy, chin up, hands held tight shut at her sides.

Kitty, distressed by the tension in the room. began to wail again.

"Whatever we do we must be swift," Darcy said. "This wastes time. Miss Bennett, put on Miss Kitty's cloak from last night and be prepared to remain hooded and silent should we encounter anyone but your sister. Bryant will get horses. I will fetch my pistol."

Bingley walked into the room with Bryant. "All is ready," he said. "I am to escort the Misses Bennetts home. Miss Georgiana will entertain my sister."

"Jane," said Elizabeth, holding out her hand. "Your weapon."

Jane blushed deeply, looking at Bingley, but reached into her little bag. "I carry it for safety," she murmured, giving Elizabeth a small but heavy pistol.

"Quite right," said Bingley. "There are some dangerous people about."

xxxx

Darcy rode hard on the trail that Bryant had found. He kept glancing back, but Elizabeth sat her horse solidly and made no protest. Darcy approved her instructions on the animal's tack, noting that her saddle had been fitted to allow a gallop or even a wore Kitty's dark clothes and could pass for a servant if need be.

The trail led, as Darcy had surmised, to. the river. Lydia's horse's hoof marks had trampled the muddy water's edge, as if she had lingered there a time. Sharper hoof marks were visible at the top of the bank, and then both sets left together.

"They plan to follow the valley and meet the turnpike road at the far end," Darcy said.

"That leads to Overton or Crookside," Elizabeth said, naming the towns which lay in either direction. "Tolfrey travelled to us from Overton."

"Then given the reputation he leaves behind him, it is more likely he will go where he is not known."

When at last the search party reached the small octagonal building which marked the start of the turnpike, they were tired. Elizabeth stepped into the toll keeper's parlor for a moment to take some water.

When she emerged, Darcy was handing over a small purse of coins - far more than the ha'penny each to pass the toll. "This good man will watch the road and send word if they pass this way after us," he told Elizabeth.

The toll road was newly made and tarmacadamed, and the going was swift. Within the hour they reached Crookside and Darcy made enquiries.

Darcy saw how it chafed Elizabeth to take so small a part in all this, but he could do no more. "Do not worry," he told her as they rode on again, aiming for a small stage inn beyond the main town, "if Tolfrey has harmed your sister, I will let you shoot him."

Elizabeth smiled, but her eyes were weary. "My sister is fifteen and foolish, she said. If he has told her he loves her -"

"Let us first find them. And let us hope to find them in church."

xxxx

At last Darcy called a halt. "It grows dark," he said as Bryant looked to the horses. "Your family will want you, Miss Bennett. And by remaining here with us, you merely add to the burden of impropriety which your sister has cast onto the Bennetts."

"I know," said Elizabeth. "But still I cannot go home without Lydia. Let us press on to the next stage and confirm that they are still ahead of us. I have a little money with me. I will stay at the inn in the company of some good woman, and we can continue tomorrow."

"You will travel as my sister and I will accommodate us all. I will ensure that your quarters are quite private."

"Let us move, sir," Bryant said uneasily. "It's not good to hang about on the open road at dusk. And I think I hear men coming."

All three paused to listen.

"Quite a body of men," Elizabeth said. "Mounted and with wagons. Let us move indeed, Mr Bryant."

The next coaching inn was modern and well fitted out. Elizabeth had a chamber above the main courtyard; Darcy selected the one next door, and charged a local girl to act as Elizabeth's maid and companion.

"It is barely sufficient," he said.

They stood in the corridor overlooking the courtyard. Smoke rose from the chimneys of the inn, which enclosed the cobbled yard on all four sides. A brick arch led to the road on one side, and to further stables on the other. Small but well lit rooms were ranged all around and, like Elizabeth's, over the arch.

"I care not," said Elizabeth. "I have sent word to my father and Jane. They expect me back tomorrow. I have not mentioned leaving Pemberley, only that an inconvenience prevented my returning with Jane. I hope my father has engaged his own searchers, but I fear he will have moved too slowly to prevent - what we all fear."

"Your sister is now away at night with a scoundrel," Darcy told her bluntly. "The worst has happened. I must tell you, Miss Bennett, that the best plan at present would be to marry and widow your sister the same day."

Elizabeth bit her lip. After a moment of seeming struggle, she spoke. "I do not understand Tolfrey's interest in Lydia, she said. She has no money. He cannot plan to marry her. Can he really be so wicked as to use her as a... plaything?"

Darcy considered, gazing out into the yard as the inn people bustled about with ale and trays of victuals. "Does Tolfrey know of your ... unusual acquaintance with me?" he asked.

"Lydia will have told him."

"Then I'm afraid the most likely plan is to try to blackmail me - threaten to expose my secret and yours - to give him money for marrying Lydia."

Elizabeth hesitated. "Mr Darcy," she began. "As generous as you have been - you must not -"

"Should it come to that, I will."

Darcy spoke without doubt. She was standing with her face turned up to look at him - pale and tired, full of sorrow and yet still proud and strong. She had done the same ride today as he, and also bore her greater family burdens.

Darcy knew that every passing moment placed the Bennetts farther and farther from his proper circle of acquaintance. He should be at home himself now, assessing Miss Bingley, a beautiful and clever woman of good family and great fortune, as a likely future mistress of Pemberley.

Yet instead he was here.

He turned to Elizabeth. "Miss Bennett, I will pay this man, to marry your sister, to reclaim what good we can from this terrible situation. I will put in place plans of which I have not yet told you, to help your family from their unfortunate associations with this fellow and his crimes. And I will do all these for purely selfish reasons."

He felt his colour rise as he spoke and she widened her eyes in understanding. "Good night, Miss Bennett. "

He walked quickly into his own room and shut the door, leant back against its rough wood grain.

Now she knew. And Darcy, in spite of everything, was glad.

Now they had no secrets at all.


	10. Chapter 10

The courtyard was filled with men, horses and noise as Darcy opened his chamber door the next morning.

Looking out of the casement he saw the bright red coats and gleaming weapons of the local regiment, and the flicking ears and swishing tails of their eager horses.

These must have been who they had heard in the wood the previous night, he realised. And he knew, then, how to retrieve Lydia.

He leaned out of the window, searching for a familiar face, and found it. "Captain! Captain!"

Thean he hailed did not respond. His head was partly concealed by his tall hat - had Darcy mistaken him?

He called again. "Wickham!"

Captain Wickham looked up then, saw Darcy, and froze.

Xxxx

Wickham looked different, Darcy thought. Vastly different from their last, uncomfortable meeting, though that was unsurprising. There had been letters since then, and matters had been set aside, and an agreement, of a sort, had been reached.

No - it was not that, nor the passing of more than a year, which made Wickham look changed. The man had always been handsome, with a jovial aspect which Darcy had never matched, nor any longer sought to: but now there was a gravity to him, a tiredness around his eyes. Darcy knew it.

"You have seen battle," he said to Wickham, as the two of them sat with toast and small beer in the inn's parlor.

"Yes," Wickham said, "and I do not wish to speak of it. I have bought out my time, Darcy, before you ask. Very soon, I will no longer be Captain Wickham, but only plain Wickham again, and that will suit me very well."

The tiredness was in his voice as well as his face, Darcy saw. There was a touch of silver at his temples. Whatever fighting Wickham had seen had marked him for life.

"I thought you enjoyed the glamour of a regimental title," Darcy said, unable to stop himself.

"I did. And now I don't." Wickham bit off a piece of hot toast, fresh from the fork, and looked Darcy squarely in the eye. "Whilst it's always a pleasure, Darcy, what is it that you want of me? You know I cannot pay you what I owe, not yet. I used it to get out of the regiment."

"And what of the money I lent you to get into the regiment?"

Wickham shrugged. "Some shopkeepers in Brighton are waiting for that."

On another occasion, this would have angered Darcy. But today he had a different purpose. "I require your help," he told Wickham. "It is a delicate matter and the private business of an acquaintance of mine. Can I be assured of your discretion?"

Wickham's eyes narrowed. "I have kept my promise regarding your... relations, have I not? You have not set eyes on me this past twelvemonth."

"This does not pertain to that matter," Darcy said quickly. "Although your particular expertise in the matter of elopement will stand you in good stead."

Rapidly he explained what he wished Wickham to do. "I will pay you half now," he added. "The remainder will be upon your safe return. You know the place?"

"St George's. We passed it on the road." Wickham looked past Darcy, then, and his face brightened. "Darcy, I believe a lady seeks your attention. She is of your party?"

Darcy looked around and saw a female servant pointing him out to Elizabeth. "This lady is Lydia Bennett's sister," he said. "She has accompanied me on the search."

"And without any guardian but you? Darcy, you dog!"

Wickham's eyes traced Elizabeth in unguarded appreciation as she crossed the room.

Darcy leaned in as Elizabeth approached. "Wickham, you are convenient, but I do not forget your history, and I will strike you if you treat Miss Bennett with anything less than the utmost respect. Either of the sisters Bennett."

Wickham smirked and bowed with Darcy as Elizabeth sat down at their table.

Darcy made introductions. "Mr Wickham is to help us find Lydia. He is the son of my late father's steward, and you may trust him to retrieve Lydia and being her home."

"A friend of Mr Darcy must be my friend too," Elizabeth said. "And you are a Captain?"

"For a little time," Wickham said. "Do you follow the troops' progress, ma'am?"

"The appeal of a uniform has rather paled of late. And I am yet unmarried, sir."

"I beg your pardon, Miss Bennett." Wickham bowed courteously, and Darcy saw that Elizabeth, for all her words, was not immune to gallantry and good looks.

"I know the former Captain Tolfrey a little," Wickham told Elizabeth. "And when the regiment last moved through Derbyshire, we shared some haunts."

So Wickham had passed close to Pemberley, and not come near. This reassured Darcy more than any words.

"You will take us to his hiding place?" Elizabeth asked eagerly.

Wickham shook his head. "Tolfrey in a corner is not a place for any that need not be there. I will go, with certain of my colleagues, and I alone will accompany her to the rendezvous."

"I do not like it," Elizabeth said plainly to Darcy. "I feel I have only moved my sister from one compromising situation to another."

"I will explain all as we travel," Darcy said. "But now, Mr Wickham must move."

They took their leave, and Wickham muttered to Darcy, "If the younger sister is as beautiful as the older, my task will be the pleasanter."

"She is more suitable than my own sister and that is all you need to remember," Darcy returned. "Now go."

The task must be completed now, no matter the cost, and there was no room for sentiment or regret. Not even for Elizabeth Bennett.


	11. Chapter 11

The forest was still. Darcy drew a breath of its clear green air and rubbed his horse's neck.

"There, sir."

Bryant pointed.

At last.

Between the trees, horses came: a brash brown, and a smaller, stumbling grey, no more than a pony. Darcy snorted in recognition. "I am no longer surprised that we have caught them within two days," he remarked to Bryant as they readied their horses to intercept the newcomers. "I am amazed that this beast did not collapse beneath its rider within the mile."

He kneed his own mount and it trotted briskly forward.

The grey halted as he approached, shied away.

Darcy reached across and calmly took the reins from the horse's rider, murmuring the beast's name as he did. "You belong in the dairy," he said. "You've no business here in the woods, with wildlings and faeries."

"I am no faery," declared Lydia Bennett. "I am a lady and I insist that you return me to my betrothed this moment!"

Darcy smiled at her wryly. "I fear he sits close by even now, Miss Bennett. And it would benefit you to begin acknowledging that soon, and publicly, for the extremely short duration of your engagement."

The brown horse skittered nearer. Its rider removed the reins from Darcy and smiled.

"Darcy, well met. You never mentioned that the lady was so headstrong. Or so captivating," Wickham added as Lydia turned towards him in startlement.

Wickham managed both horses expertly. Darcy dismounted and helped Lydia to the ground. "We have a carriage, "he told her. "Your sister Elizabeth is in it and has been most worried for your safety."

Perhaps he had hoped, even yet, for feminine tears and self-reproach.

He did not get it. Lydia tilted her chin and said, "You are too late, Mr Darcy. Mr Tolfrey is my husband in all but name."

Her bold eye and womanly form were certainly striking, Darcy allowed. But this brazen speech must be curbed. "All the more reason to join your sister as you must have much news to share."

Lydia held out her arm to him with great disdain. It reminded him not a little of his great aunt... The certainty of her own superiority, in the face of all available evidence.

Wickham brought the horses through the trees to where a small, battered open carriage waited in the road. Elizabeth sat at the reins, calm, but keeping a watchful eye all around. Beside her sat a large bag, and a basket of flowers.

When she saw Lydia, she flung down the reins and jumped down, running to embrace her. "Lydia! Oh, Lydia, you stupid girl, what have you done? Are you well? Is she well, Mr Wickham?" This last, sharply to Wickham who was fastening the grey and brown to the piebald pair drawing the carriage.

"She is well, Miss Bennett. "

"Where is Tolfrey," Elizabeth asked then, holding Lydia at arm's length to inspect her.

"He is with my companions from the regiment," Wickham said. "They will bring him to the necessary place."

"Then let us repair there as soon as we may," Darcy said. "We go to St George's at once. Miss Bennett, please ready your sister for her wedding."

Lydia saw the flowers and exclaimed. "What, is my mother here? But where is Tolfrey?"

Elizabeth reached into the carriage for the bag, and began drawing items from it. "Lydia, please wrap yourself in this cloak, and tie on this fresh apron. Your hair is shocking. Stand still while I try to make it good."

Darcy and Wickham turned tactfully away as Elizabeth hurried with Lydia's toilette. Bryant helped Wickham off with his rough riding coat.

"Darcy," Wickham said in an apologetic tone. He jerked his head in the direction of Lydia.

"Of course," said Darcy. He took out a folded paper. "My banker is on the Strand. He will make the arrangements."

Wickham glanced at the paper, whistled, then tucked it away with a nod. "Thank you," he said. "This amount is more generosity than I had expected."

"Wait til you meet her family," said Darcy. "Then you may tell me how generous I am."

Soon all was ready. Darcy turned and saw Lydia, crowned with great flowers, and draped in a soft grey hooded cloak. A bright white apron concealed her dirty clothes.

"I can do nothing for her shoes," said Elizabeth with a sigh, "but the rest is improved."

"Am I really to be married today?" Lydia asked, eyes shining.

"Yes," said Wickham, coming forward in his red dress coat to take her arm, "we are."


	12. Chapter 12

Lydia was a surprising young person, Darcy concluded as he followed the wedding carriage, his horse tired but strong, with Elizabeth on a fresh horse beside his.

He had prepared himself for tears, even screams, as their plan for Lydia and Wickham became clear. But Lydia listened closely, looked Wickham over with calculating eyes. and agreed. "He is handsome enough," she said, "even for me."

She did say, as if making a token protest, "Could we not go and find Tolfrey and then I can marry him?"

"He has a meeting with another lady," Darcy said. "A tall lady with a long rope."

"Then why must I marry at all," Lydia said, brushing off Darcy's reference.

Elizabeth tired of the discussion. She clutched Lydia's arm and hissed, "Because you might be with child! You cannot stay unwed!"

Lydia looked down at her belly and then up at Elizabeth. "Very well then. I do not mind Wickham. But Mama will be most upset when I tell her -"

"You will tell our parents nothing," Elizabeth said in a voice of iron. "We will explore it all to them, and you and Wickham will agree, and if he is not killed dead by the shock, our father may choose to set you up in life with your husband."

xxxx

The journey back to Pemberley village, where the Bennetts rented their house, was long and Darcy was glad that he had gone to the trouble and expense of a carriage for Lydia, for she complained frequently of boredom and seemed unaware that her sister, on horseback, must be more fatigued than she.

More than once Wickham, with commendable gallantry, invited Elizabeth to join them in the carriage, but Elizabeth declined. She was silent and thoughtful today, her face set, her bonnet drawn tight about her eyes.

The road passed through the forest, and Darcy remained alert for trouble, but there were only the trees, and the plump red squirrels, and the birds chorusing a wedding march for Mr and Mrs Wickham.

* * *

"It was all my doing," Elizabeth confessed in a low voice to her parents in Mr Bennett's library. The rest of the house had ot yet been summoned to meet the new arrivals. Wickham and Lydia were being fussed over by Mrs Bennett. Darcy stood by, affecting not to hear.

"Your doing, Lizzie?" exclaimed Mr Bennett. He touched several books on his desk, as if seeking reassurance from their faded covers.

"Our Lydia, married, and not yet sixteen!" Mrs Bennett said, stroking Lydia's hair.

"Lydia and Mr Wickham met at Pemberley and planned to elope," Elizabeth said. "I could not disssuade them so to ensure Lydia's safety I accompanied them in this mad plan. I am sorry to have disappointed you so, Papa. But things have turned out for the good, I think."

Mr Bennett looked from Wickham, clearly already a favourite with the Bennett ladies, to Elizabeth, standing steady and sombre. He cast a glance at Darcy, who looked across as if just noticing the conversation. "Good, you say? My youngest, married without my consent to a near stranger! What madness is this, Lizzie? You are always so sensible - how could this thing have occurred?"

"Believe me, Papa, the alternative does not bear thinking about," Elizabeth whispered.

Mr Bennett harrumphed for a moment or two, and then brightened. "Ah well, it is done now, and we are all here safe. I must make the acquaintance of my fine new son in law and see if his mind is as fine as his very fine looks."

Elizabeth hugged her father. "Thank you, Papa. And now let us call Jane, where is she? I have wanted her these last two days."

"She is in the parlour with Kitty, Mary - and Mr Bingley." Mrs Bennett could not disguise her glee. "He has called here every day while you were gone and seems most attentive to Jane."

Darcy stiffened. Elizabeth shot him an anxious look.

"Let us all go in," she said quickly. "Lydia, you should take Mr Wickham's arm and go in first."

"Oh yes!" exclaimed Lydia. "I am really married! They will all be so surprised."

"None as surprised as I," said Mr Bennett, picking up his spectacles.

Or I, thought Darcy, but said nothing.

* * *

"And what is your income, Mr Wickham?" asked Mrs Bennett as the new son in law perched between her and Mr Bennett in their sunny sitting room.

Mr Bennett flinched. "You are ever to the point, my dear, but perhaps Mr Wickham would prefer not to discuss these matters before those who are nor family members," with a glance at Darcy.

Elizabeth, seated across the room with Kitty and Mary, burst in: "Papa, Mr Darcy has been such a help to us. and indeed has been such a longstanding... Acquaintance of Mr Wickham, that really he might be considered as... Family."

"Really, Lizzie? Has this matchmaking business set you in the mood to make everyone part of our family? Be warned, Mr Darcy, you may be next."

Darcy bowed. "I would never presume," he murmured. What a strange and wry man Mr Bennett was. It was clear whence Elizabeth had got her sharp wit.

"What, slight my Lizzie! Lizzie, this gentleman would never, he says. Ah, well, that's for the best. I have avoided the cost of one daughter's wedding, but I cannot hope for such luck again." Mr Bennett sipped tea and hummed to himself.

Elizabeth was wincing, Darcy saw. "Perhaps the ladies would like to rest, Sir," he suggested. "It has been a taxing time."

He rose, and Mr Bennett and Mr Wickham followed suit. He glanced at Bingley - but he had not moved, sitting engrossed in conversation with Jane Bennett.

Bingley looked up belatedly and scrambled to his feet. Darcy saw that Bingley had actually been holding Miss Bennett's gloved hand, as if... in supplication.

Miss Bennett remained serene as ever as she inclined her head in farewell.

Darcy wrinkled his brow, then caught Elizabeth watching him, and cleared his face of all expression.

Bingley and Jane Bennett! Darcy felt a tremor in his knees. It must be the riding, the chase, the hard work of rescuing Lydia. It could not be the shock of seeing his friend with another of the Bennett sisters, and another potential problem to resolve.

Darcy felt a powerful need to return home and be certain the Georgiana was well. He bowed to the Bennetts, now arranged with their newfound son in law in their midst, and quickly departed.


	13. Chapter 13

The Wickhams were on honeymoon, Tolfrey was under lock and key, and Darcy was back at Pemberley. Summer was turning full and preparing to drop away into autumn. He surveyed the harvest preparations, watched Georgiana at her music, and entertained the Bingleys, who had extended their stay.

This, Darcy reminded himself, was an excellent opportunity to become better acquainted with the admirable and certainly beautiful and accomplished Miss Bingley. He spent many hours listening to her most proficient piano playing, and accompanied her on walk, the better to appreciate her fine sensibilities and highly developed conversational skills.

Caroline Bingley accepted his attentions with pleasure and, he noted, a certain smiling arrogance, as if all this were no more than her due. It jarred, and Darcy withdrew into silence to avoid speaking his mind too frankly before the ladies. Caroline did not understand wit and viewed it merely as a conversational weapon.

It would not do to tease her into a better humility. And she was not the sort of lady who might accept guidance from her brother. Darcy wondered if she would accept it from her husband. He believed he knew the answer to that.

Bingley was delighted by it all, as he was by everything Darcy did. Bingley was a fool ... but a pleasant and sincere fool, without malice anywhere in him. If Bingley could not see a fault in his sister, it was hardly a character flaw.

Bingley had invited Miss Bennett - or rather, Miss Bingley had - to visit them at Pemberley.

"I did not know your preference for Miss Bennett," Darcy observed when he heard, walking about the parlour with Caroline on his arm. It would have been more accurate to say, Your every word and look spoke of your despite.

"Oh but I am most partial to dear Jane!" came the cry, with a simper. Darcy disliked simpering. What was its purpose?

Some ladies never found the need to simper.

"And when I Iearned of her secret - Oh, but I must not betray a confidence. and you must not ask!"

She tapped him playfully with her fan.

He bowed. "Then I will not."

She pursed her lips and they continued about the room. "Dear Jane," exclaimed Caroline hopefully once or twice, but Darcy did not enquire.

"Miss Bennett brings Miss Elizabeth Bennett with her," Bingley called from his place at the piano, turning music for Georgiana. "Perhaps she can make poor Brandon smile again. He will be here that same day, I believe?"

"You are right."

"Miss Elizabeth Bennett is so droll," said Caroline archly. "Quite a wit."

"I know her but little," Darcy said. This was an untruth, he reflected. He had seen her struggle white-faced, through a ride which would have left most ladies fainting. He had seen her comfort her sister before her marriage with no word of blame. He had seen her - dressed in black, astride a horse, pointing a pistol steadily into the face of her enemy.

"I so look forward to seeing Miss Elizabeth and Colonel Brandon again," Caroline said fulsomely. "Miss Elizabeth, though not beautiful, is almost striking enough for him, I think."

Darcy bowed.

* * *

Darcy leaned on the mantel and smiled at Georgiana across the room as she played. Elizabeth stood nearby admiring a piece of Caroline's work laid on a table, a fine, delicate piece with brilliant colours worked so small and neat it was hard to believe a human needle had done it.

Darcy spoke. "My sister is but Lydia's age, and the sweetest girl. She sings and plays, writes sonnets though she professes not to, paints and draws with some distinction, and has a tolerable knowledge of Italian and French, though is scarcely comprehensible in German. And her work is good, many ladies have complimented her upon it."

Elizabeth smiled. "Knowing your superlative standards, from this critical description I must conclude that your sister, in fact, excels in all these things and is especially brilliant at those you do not qualify."

Darcy gave a small grimace. "I have no gift of praise," he admitted. "I believe my sister the most perfect in almost every respect, but I feel it would not improve her to constantly hear it."

"And of course ladies always wish to be improved. It is our desire every moment to progress in virtue. Never do we wish only for the audience to clap and smile politely, that we may sit down again. And it is rarely pleasant when our efforts are simply appreciated, with no thought as to their place in our menu of accomplishments." Elizabeth smiled and turned away from the fabulously intricate embroidery she had been inspecting.

Darcy paced to the end, and returned. "You are right, of course," he said.

Elizabeth looked up at him in astonishment.

"My sister is beloved to me and already more accomplished than many not so young as she. I ought to praise her more, for no reason but the pleasure she brings me."

Elizabeth opened her lips but seemed not to know how to reply.

"What goes on," asked Georgiana, coming near.

"Your brother tells me he does not know how to give praise," said Elizabeth, "in the same breath as lending you the very highest compliments."

Georgiana took Darcy's arm and squeezed it. "My brother is most affectionate," she assured Elizabeth earnestly. "And his praise, once earned, is most heartfelt and the better for being rarer."

She was such a sweet girl. Darcy kissed her gloved hand and sent her off to sit with the Bingleys.

He saw Elizabeth, as she moved to join them, glance back at him with a quick glance of - approval? Gratitude? He could not tell. But her sparkling eyes spoke of secrets shared and more understood between them than could be spoken of.

Or perhaps Darcy lent her expression these accents to better fit his own feelings. He could not tell.

"I see you have been examining my little piece," Miss Bingley said, smirking. "What is your opinion? I am sure it is the most terrible mess." This in a tone of strident self confidence.

Did Elizabeth glance back at him as she gave her reply?

She smiled and said, "Miss Bingley, you are indeed most accomplished."

Darcy chuckled.


	14. Chapter 14

**Author's Note: Firstly an apology for the wait for an update. This is only short but more is coming. Also, I wrote 'Brandon' in the last chapter where of course I meant 'Fitzwilliam'. Too much Austen! It is Fitzwilliam from now on. **

* * *

Another soiree at Pemberley. Darcy felt himself in danger of becoming known as a social man. This evening the company was the Bingleys, the Bennett family and his cousin Fitzwilliam.

A sense of mischief had led him to sit Miss Bingley and Fitzwilliam together. He wanted Fitzwilliam's honest opinion of her, of course, but in addition he was growing weary of his own attempts to court her. It was not his lack of success in that field which led him to withdraw: rather the reverse, her eager acceptance of his courtesies, which tired him.

She was simply not a very interesting lady. She lacked wit.

"Wit is not required," Fitzwilliam said as the two men stood with cigars on the terrace, as the ladies retired to the parlour. "Only fortune, and willingness to tolerate you, are required."

Fitzwilliam was fond of these teasing remarks. He was a soldier, and unmarried, and had never looked for a wife, that Darcy was aware. He had no heir to consider.

"She is willing to tolerate my fortune," said Darcy.

"It is indeed a piece of luck that you are a wealthy man. Were you a pauper you would end your days a bachelor."

They both chuckled.

"Darcy," Fitzwilliam began. "May I speak frankly?"

"It is why I invited your thoughts."

"Miss Bingley has many admirable qualities. But an ability to bring you happiness, as a wife, does not appear to be one of them. I have barely seen you smile since I arrived."

Darcy considered Fitzwilliam. The man knew nothing of marriage, yet most likely, more than Darcy of the ways of women.

"I speak as one man to another," Fitzwilliam emphasised.

Darcy nodded curtly. His cousin referred to the intimacies of marriage, to the pleasure a man might take of a woman and the children he might give her.

These things were not required, of course - pleasure. Duty only was required. But a lifetime of duty with Miss Bingley seemed a daunting prospect.

"I see you take my meaning," Fitzwilliam said in a low voice.

"Yes. Thank you."

"You have made no move?"

"None. Her brother expects it. She expects it."

"They may continue to expect. Perhaps Bingley may be called back to town, though. Expectations may dim from a distance."

Darcy grasped Fitzwilliam's hand. "An excellent suggestion. I have been wearied by this and you have brought me some consolation."

Fitzwilliam bowed."If I am released from further duties for the moment, I see that Miss Bennett requires someone to turn the pages at the piano."

"I expect Bingley will assist," Darcy said, turning back towards the room.

But the lady at the piano was not Jane, but Elizabeth. Fitzwilliam joined her, smiling, and she began, rather imperfectly, to play.

* * *

The Bennetts and Bingleys were at cards, and Darcy stood by the French window staring into the darkened rose garden. The search must begin again. Mrs Darcy, a notional bride existing principally in the minds of society, must be discovered and established.

She possessed many good qualities and chief among these was the ability not to bore Darcy with every utterance. He could endure many things but not boredom. One glance at Mr Bennett showed what years of marriage to a woman not one's intellectual equal would do to a man. As beautiful as Mrs Bennett had clearly been - five children! evidence of her many charms - it was insufficient in life.

No. Mrs Darcy must be beautiful, naturally, but also intelligent, witty, charming, capable, able to face the danger he himself so craved...

Darcy stopped his thought, began again. There would be no more danger-seeking after his marriage. That was a mark of irresponsibility.

And what respectable lady could stand steady at his side in the presence of peril?

Stop, stop this, it must not be. His foolish outburst at the inn, she had made no remark, he must forget ever having such thoughts. They were not appropriate thoughts.

They were not thoughts at all, but a feeling, a tremor which travelled through his belly whenever he looked at her, whenever he recalled her dressed in black, her gentle fingers caressing the grip of a pistol.

She was walking towards him now, moving with simple grace. He gathered himself and focused on her plain white dress and gentlewoman's demeanour.

They greeted each other and remarked on the tedium of cards. Elizabeth looked at Darcy, that bold look which challenged him to surprise her.

"I have asked our father to invite our cousin here," Elizabeth said then. "He has replied in the affirmative, and made it clear that his visit will be both for pleasure and practicality, as he says, as plainly as I repeat it now, that he intends to choose a wife from among the young ladies of our family."

Darcy nodded. "A fine plan. This, I understand, will assist with your family's... Retrenchment."

"Yes. And I have told Jane, no matter her protestations, that I am to be Mr Collins' choice. " Elizabeth sighed. "I must hope that Mr Collins and I get on."

Darcy froze. "You?" He said stupidly.

"Indeed. Although I am not the eldest, or the most beautiful, I am to be the one. My sisters are too foolish and Jane...Jane is too dear to me. "

"But you have not yet met Mr Collins?"

"I have read his letters," Elizabeth said. "They do not lend me much hope of our being compatible, but still, we all must do what we must. This is the lot of the young lady without a fortune, Mr Darcy. She must marry where she can, and preference cannot enter into it. "

"But love," he began, and then realised he did not have a proper ending.

"Love is an ideal," said Elizabeth. "I would dearly like to have that choice. But four unmarried sisters and their lost fortune, must forego those dreams."

"Darcy, do you draw this lady into a corner to talk about love?" cried Fitzwilliam, joining them.

Darcy saw Mrs Bennett's head turn delightedly, her ears catching these playful words. A timely reminder of the perils of loving foolishly.

Elizabeth saw too, and a rosy blush spread from her face to her throat and decolletage. "Mr Darcy is a romantic," she said.

"Darcy! I refuse to believe it. He is a practical man like myself. These notions of romance are as foreign to him as pigeons on a duckpond."

Elizabeth smiled. Was she remembering the inn, his declaration? "Mr Darcy believes in marrying for love," she said "even where love is out of the question."

Darcy flinched at the scorn in her voice. "There are many cases where marriages are made from both love and a proper consideration of the standing of both parties," he said stiffly.

Elizabeth flushed, then frowned a little at this. Fitzwilliam too. "And can you refer me to any of those examples?" she asked with a crack in her voice.

Too slowly Darcy realised that her hard tone was not scorn but bitterness. "There are many," he repeated like a fool.

She turned her face away, affecting interest in the roses beyond the window.

"It is a pleasant evening, Miss Bennett," said Fitzwilliam. "I will be taking the air in the garden. Would you care to join me?" He held out his arm.

"Gladly," said Elizabeth.

They walked out arm in arm, leaving Darcy alone with the card table and his own harsh thoughts for company.

xxx


	15. Chapter 15

Mr Collins was a tall man, and thin, whose clothes draped his frame but awkwardly. He wore the dark garb and white cravat of a clergyman and enjoyed quoting verses in a worthy tone. He moved in jerks and twitches and seemed permanently nervous. Darcy disliked him at once, for this alone: a man who could not exist in comfort in his own skin was no man at all, in his opinion. Mr Collins was also an effusive talker and an unskilled flatterer, both qualities Darcy despised when neither talking nor flattery were necessary.

At their first meeting - a visit to the Bennetts with Bingley and Fitzwilliam, a required courtesy between neighbours - Collins paid great attention to Jane Bennett, which diverted Darcy briefly. He stood by the window of the Bennetts' one parlour, with his face turned slightly towards the fields, but watched from the corner of his eye as Collins grew ever closer to Jane, and Bingley grew as near to anger as Darcy had ever seen him.

"Mrs Bennett," said Collins, balancing a teacup and saucer in one hand in a way which made Darcy curl his lip, "the beauty and, ah, talents of your daughters surpass even your own and I find myself quite breathless in the presence of so much ... beauty," he finished.

"Oh Mr Collins. You flatter me too much!"

For once Mrs Bennett spoke quite accurately.

"Perhaps you would like some more tea," said Jane, rising to attend to this matter. Collins' hand shot out to prevent her and Jane flinched.

"No, no," he protested, "I am perfectly happy at your side. Do not move in order to fulfil a mere bodily need. My heart is sated with the ... presence of so much beauty," he said again, as if this were the only speech he had prepared.

Jane evaded the hand and moved gracefully away, going to stand by Elizabeth at the sideboard. They took a long time to pour one cup of tea, and Darcy could see them exchanging glances. An argument. No words passed between them, just looks, Jane's clearly saying, Leave me be, I can manage, and Elizabeth's just as clearly saying, No, this is my concern.

A wordless argument between sisters. Darcy felt strangely touched. But perhaps this was only because he was aware of Mr Collins' purpose in visiting his cousins.

"Miss Bennett!" exclaimed Bingley with sufficient force to attract every eye in the room. He blushed. "Perhaps you would be so kind as to show me the unusual rose you mentioned when we last visited? Is it in bloom yet?"

Jane moved from the sideboard at last and gave Mr Collins his tea with an outstretched arm. "It is still in bud," she said, glancing up at Bingley. "But soon it will bloom, I think."

"Excellent," said Bingley as if the progress of a flower were of vital importance. He nodded to Mr and Mrs Bennett, and taking Jane's arm drew her into the garden.

Elizabeth watched them leave and her expression was guarded and still.

Mr Collins looked flustered. Turned his head this way and that, eyes passing over Mary, absorbed self righteously in her work, a sampler with a moral message, and Kitty, whose work may have been a bonnet or a glove, it was impossible to tell from the shape of the thing, and rested upon Elizabeth, standing by the sideboard still, blushingly conscious of her cousin's gaze bright upon her.

Mrs Bennett glanced at Mr Darcy, who affected not to notice. "We are expecting happy news for Jane very soon," she said in a pointed whisper to Mr Collins. "Wedding bells! Although my other daughter are at present... unhindered."

"Mama," said Elizabeth warningly. Darcy could feel her embarrassment.

"Everyone sees it but you," said Mrs Bennett scoldingly.

"Mr Collins," said Elizabeth quickly, turning the subject, "is your tea to your liking? Can I offer you a little more milk?"

"It is delicious," said Mr Collins. "Although tea is not my primary purpose in visiting your modest home." He looked meaningfully at Elizabeth, who smiled painfully.

Fitzwilliam was observing these exchanges with amusement. "Is tea the primary motivation of any visit?" he asked the room in general. "I hesitate to suggest that I could form the attraction, but I flatter myself that visitors to my home come with more than a warm drink as their aim."

Elizabeth smiled for the first time all afternoon. "The company must be very poor indeed if the tea is the main objective," she said.

"Or the tea must be superb," said Fitzwilliam, smiling back at her.

"I would never suggest -" said Mr Collins.

"Perhaps if one were starved of tea," said Elizabeth. "I can imagine making a visit purely for tea, if one had been out of society - perhaps wandering alone, in nature - and without tea for an extended period."

Darcy turned towards the room in time to see Fitzwilliam's eyes light up. "What wilderness would not contain tea?" he asked Elizabeth.

"There must be many places in the world where a person would miss tea," she said, her eyes dancing to his.

"Never here," said Fitzwilliam. "I hope, never here."

Elizabeth glanced at the teapot as her sisters and Mr Collins stared in confusion, and then back to Fitzwilliam. "Even here," she said softly, and there was a look, one look, the only look all afternoon, at Darcy. Her eyes were sharp.

"Let us all walk in the garden," said Mr Bennett then, rising from his chair in the corner. "It will enliven us in preparation for further tea."

Mr Darcy looked across at him and almost smiled.

It was a warm day, in early June, too early for roses despite Bingley's hopes. Darcy wandered about the garden, content enough in his own company for the moment. He never brought his sister to these social calls, he reflected. Perhaps from now on he should. She was so shy and it would encourage her.

He strolled into the small orchard, the fresh scent of leaves in his nostrils. He was glad that he and Fitzwilliam had ridden over; a gallop on the way back, in such weather, would lift his spirits from the laxity into which they had lately fallen.

He was thinking this when a commotion attracted his attention. A shriek as if a lady had been stung by a bee.

Darcy started toward the sound, but it was followed, inexplicably, by laughter. Sobs came quickly after.

He hurried from the orchard and found Jane Bennett, and Bingley, in the middle of a clutch of exclaiming, shrilling women. Jane was in Elizabeth's arms and Bingley was holding Mr Bennett's hand as if he would never let go.

The shriek had been from Mrs Bennett, who seemed quite overcome. "Married!" she cried. "My Jane, my beautiful Jane, married!"

It was the work of an instant to understand that Bingley had proposed to Jane and been accepted.

Fitzwilliam came to stand with Darcy. "A happy moment," observed Fitzwilliam.

"Indeed," said Darcy. Jane was crying, Elizabeth too, and Mary and Kitty were chattering about dresses.

Bingley approached, flushed with happiness. "Darcy, congratulate me!" he cried, and Darcy gladly did so. "It is the most wonderful thing," Bingley said, "to love and be loved. Darcy, I entirely recommend it. And I hope to see you as happy as I am now, very soon." He gave Darcy a meaningful look and was gone again, drawn into a noisy discussion about dates and honeymoons.

Darcy only smiled. "I fear I can never be as happy as Bingley," he said. "I have not the disposition."

"It only wants effort," said Fitzwilliam. "Anyone can learn to be loved."

Darcy glanced at him in surprise and found Fitzwilliam's eyes had turned towards Elizabeth.

Mr Collins was bowing and hand-shaking and inserting himself into every conversation. He began a long explanation of the parts of the marriage service, and of a sudden Darcy had to escape. He made his apologies, congratulated his friend and Miss Bennett once again, and left.

Elizabeth, married to such a man. It was impossible to contemplate and yet he must. But any other outcome must be preferable to this.

* * *

A morning in late June found Mr Darcy still burdened by unwelcome thoughts, and since the engagement of Jane Bennett and Bingley, still burdened with Miss Bingley under his roof.

He rose early, thinking to enjoy the solitude of his house a while before the others came in for breakfast. But as he descended the stairs he found Fitzwilliam there before him, pulling on his gloves.

"Going out?" Darcy asked.

"I am paying a call on Mr Bennett," said Fitzwilliam. "As a courtesy." His uniform is sharp and perfectly clean, and he has taken extra care, today, with his moustache.

Darcy looks at him, showing a little disbelief that anyone would seek out the company of the Bennett household, even Mr Bennett, before breakfast.

"I find I am enjoying the company of the Misses Bennett greatly," Fitzwilliam says with a rueful grin. "Even food must wait until I have laid eyes on their beauty."

"Then it is serious indeed," says Darcy with a smile. "Which Miss Bennett has the favour of your attention?"

"There can be only one," Fitzwilliam says. "Her beauty is such as I have never seen. So gentle, kind, all things feminine and delicate. And destined it seems to be the wife of another man."

Darcy smiled. Jane. Every gentleman who had met her, had been in love with Jane Bennett's beauty for a time.

Fitzwilliam went on. "Darcy, I fear I may be lost, for married to all these charms are a sparkling wit which I long to taste more of. I have never met a woman like her and now I go to talk with her father. A prelude, you understand. A mere prelude. But I wish to make myself known to the esteemed Mr Bennett, before declaring myself to Miss Elizabeth."

Darcy stood still. He could not move. "Miss Elizabeth," he said awkwardly. "I thought you were going to say, Miss Jane Bennett."

"Jane Bennett?" Fitzwilliam laughed. "Bingley would have my eyes. No, Darcy, there is only one of the Misses Bennett for me, and that is Elizabeth. I have never met a finer woman. I have never been in love before, but I find that it is a wonderful state."

"I wish you well," Darcy said out of sheer habit.

"I thank you. But now I must away, for a man in love does not wait for others to step into his place." He bowed to Darcy and walked off, whistling.


	16. Chapter 16

The coat of Darcy's favourite horse gleamed in the noon sunshine. The stables were busy and all the horses had been exercised. It was good to do this, to work, to groom a mount, to feel sweat and the ache in one's muscles, and be simply a man, working.

Fitzwilliam arrived back at a slow trot and dismounted. He seemed dispirited, Darcy noticed at once.

"How did you fare?" Darcy asked with great control. His hands were on the horse's neck. The animal breathed steadily, calmly.

"I was too late," Fitzwilliam said in a low voice. A groom took his horse and led it away.

Darcy lifted his head. Not engaged to Elizabeth.

"Her heart belongs to another."

Darcy felt his own heart beating rapidly in his breast.

"Muss Bennett is to marry her cousin, Mr Collins," said Fitzwilliam flatly, "and all is lost. Excuse me." He bowed to Darcy and walked smartly away.

Darcy's hand moved across his horse's neck, over and over, soothing the beast, pouring on calm which he did not feel.

After a few moments he stopped abruptly and snapped his fingers for a stable boy. He handed over the horse and stalked away.

* * *

Darcy kept to the wilderness he was constructing to the south of Pemberley's estate, and thought of Elizabeth.

She had defied society to ride out in search of highwaymen. She wielded a pistol and ride astride like a man. Her bold eyes and sharp wit were out of keeping with the understood forms of polite company. She had spent the night from home with a man who was not brother, father or husband.

And yet it was her latest act which most horrified Darcy. She had contracted to marry a man she did not love, or even like, in order to secure her fortune and that of her sisters. And this act, which now struck Darcy as so disgraceful, was encouraged and expected of a woman without money of her own.

He thought of Bingley, who had surprised Darcy by proposing to Jane without first seeking Darcy's approval. Perhaps he assumed he had it, as Darcy was supposedly about to become his brother in law. Surely Elizabeth realised that Bingley, wed to Jane, would never allow the Bennetts' situation to fall beneath that which was acceptable in the relations of his wife?

But he understood her here, too. She wished to take on this burden, and spare Jane.

He would curse her if he could. Even Fitzwilliam, were she not to favour Darcy himself - even Elizabeth wed to Fitzwilliam, might find happiness. But Collins!

It could not be borne. And yet, because this was the result of Darcy's own too high opinion of himself, his reticence and his mistaken assumptions about the marriage which would most suit him, borne it must be.

* * *

"There is to be a ball," Darcy said, laying down Mr Bennett's letter.

It was tea time, and pouring outside. Fitzwilliam had not been seen all day, for the third day in a row. Darcy had occupied himself with the magistrate, as there were many concerns over troubles arising after the great goose-fair in Nottingham. He had but now turned to personal correspondence.

"Where?" exclaimed Georgiana.

"The Bennetts'. They invite us to celebrate the engagement of Miss Elizabeth Bennett to her cousin." He spoke levelly, imagining that he held a pistol to the head of a thief, a charlatan, a wife-trader.

His sister was watching him. She laid her hand on his arm. "Perhaps business keeps you away, "she said.

He looked at her.

"You have been much occupied with business of late," she said. "It keeps you from home and even calls you away in the night."

Her eyes were wide and honest. But she was intelligent and she had not been deceived.

"I must attend," Darcy said. "It is expected."

She laughed. "When do you exist to fulfill the expectations of others? -Will Fitzwilliam attend?"

"No. -I know not. I think he goes to town." Darcy expected his cousin to leave with little notice, and forgave him the discourtesy. He understood Fitzwilliam.

"Then fail to attend together. You can ... console him. I know he had a disappointment." Georgiana's face showed delicacy.

"I cannot." Darcy pushed away his rose-patterned cup.

"What do you mean?"

"I cannot console him." He was drumming his fingers on the linen cloth, his frustration escaping in that relentless beat.

She looked at him.

"Then ride," she said. "It is a horrid day. The rain will soak you and the mud will cover you. Ride."

He regarded her. She was so young yet wise. "You think I am a coward in this," he said.

"No," she said. "Never that."

"I will not hide," he said then. "I will go and offer my congratulations as I must. I have no reason to shrink from this."

She looks at him closely, her eyes bright and alert. "You have not made yourself known," she said.

He felt shame then, that she had seen this thing so clearly. Had others too?

"It is only that I know you," she reassured him. She squeezed his hands.

"I have made myself known," he said in a low voice. "To Miss Bennett."

"And what said she?"

"Nothing," he said. "I did not give her time to reply."

He had gone into his chamber and shut the door.

Georgiana's eyes brightened. "Then there is still hope," she said. "Miss Elizabeth must have her chance."

He caught her hand in his fist, kissed it. "You are so dear," he said. "But Elizabeth Bennett has made her choice."

"I don't believe she has," said his sister. "You must speak."

"I cannot, now."

She gazed at him. That stubbornness which was so like his own.

"You must," she said.

And that, in her eyes, settled the matter.

* * *

The Bennetts' house was lit with torches and they had hired staff to manage the carriages and banquet. Darcy and Georgiana climbed down and Mr and Mrs Bennett, beaming, greeted them. Darcy clearly heard Mrs Bennett's whispered amazement that he graced them with his presence. He shut his ears to her muttered plots to match him to others of her daughters.

Georgiana was pale and nervous. Darcy held her arm firmly, and allowed her sweet innocence to win over their hosts where her stumbling formalities could not.

"Let us go first to Miss Bennett and Mr Collins," she murmured when the greeting was done, "and then we shall see where we stand."

Darcy ought to be shamed, that his own sister, barely a woman herself, was in his confidence on this affair of the heart. But he had never trusted her, since the business with Wickham, and he knew, now, that he owed her that courtesy. He nodded his assent.

Elizabeth stood with Collins at the head of the candle-lit room, a still cog in an engine of celebratory bustle. She wore a duck egg blue gown and white rosebuds in her hair. Her gloves were white. That was all Darcy noticed about her costume. His eyes were drawn at once to her face, and never left it, even as he bowed to Collins, shook his passive hand, spoke words of conventional congratulation.

Elizabeth looked like a maiden tied to a cliff, awaiting the dragon but wishing the tide would take her first. Her skin was white and her eyes wild and desperate. She did not smile. Darcy thought that she attempted cool dignity, in her expression. He thought also that she failed.

His heart filled with anger and pain. Her sacrifice to save her family's fortune was insupportable.

Collins was exclaiming over Georgiana's excessive beauty in a way most unbecoming an engaged gentleman, and it was time to move away and allow others to extend their pleasantries. But Darcy had taken Elizabeth's hand and could not let go.

He stared at her with all the said and unsaid words in his heart, and she flinched. Her fingers clenched around his.

Darcy bent his head over her glove as if to kiss it, and said quietly, 'I admire and respect you too much to question your decision, however much it pains me." He pressed his lips to the buttons which ran up the inside of her wrist. "But setting aside all pride, I ... beg you, reconsider." He hesitated, abandoned control even as Elizabeth's fiance stood by, and kissed the palm of her glove. "Please."

She drew her hand away, blushing and glancing at Collins.

Proprieties, now? When they had ridden together in pursuit of a robber? When they had met in the darkness to capture her sister's lover and wed her instead to a hired man? Darcy felt it like a jab in the gut.

"Brother, we monopolize these good people," said Georgiana beside him, and drew him away, smiling.

She held his arm as far as the drinks table. A man in unlikely livery poured them cups of punch. Georgiana led Darcy to the French windows and they stood out of earshot.

"You are incorrigible," she said. She sipped her punch and wrinkled her nose. "This is not punch, it is far too strong!"

"I usually water yours down," Darcy said. He was still seeing Elizabeth's wretched face and feeling the warmth of her wrist through the glove.

"Once again you opened your heart to her and yet gave her no opportunity to reply," Georgiana said.

"There was no need," Darcy told her. "Her face said all. She was embarrassed." He swallowed his punch and moved to take his sister's cup too, but she held it away and drank deeply, meeting his eye.

"You are an idiot," she said then, but gently. "She blushed, it's true. As well she might with her admirer pressing his affections upon her in public. But her face, did you not understand? Did you not observe, as you declared yourself?"

"What? Observe what?"

Georgiana placed her empty cup on the sill and took Darcy's hands in both hers. "Elizabeth's eyes," she whispered. "When you begged her. Her eyes were full of tears."


	17. Chapter 17

There was dancing and an amusing speech from Mr Bennett, and a painful one from Collins.

Mr Bingley and Jane appeared and Bingley was pressed upon to give a speech too. He gave it, blushing, clasping Jane's hand, and Darcy felt his eyes water a little at the easy manner in which Bingley expressed his love for his future wife.

"It is indeed affecting," whispered Georgiana, wiping her eyes unashamedly. "Ask Miss Bennett to dance."

He considers this. They are now of longstanding acquaintance. She cannot refuse.

"Ask her," Georgiana said. "I will ask you in the morning for her reply." She gathers her stole around herself. "I have ordered our carriage. I am fatigued by all the excitement. And all the speeches."

"Stay," Darcy told her. "You should dance yourself. There are respectable gentlemen here, and of course Bingley."

"Bingley has eyes for no one but Jane Bennett. I want to sleep. Goodnight." She kissed him and disappeared into the crowd.

Darcy stood at the side of the room, his usual position, watching the festivities. It grew late and still he had made no moved from the spot. Elizabeth mingled with the crowd, paraded around by her proud mother, or guided from the more overpowering congratulations by her soft spoken father. Collins ate a prodigious amount of food and talked of his patroness, Lady Catherine de Bough, to anyone who came near. He showed no inclination to speak to Darcy, however, for which Darcy was glad. His noble relative was not a welcome topic for conversation.

No one came near Darcy and he cursed his own awkwardness in these situations. At home, this was straightforward. But here he felt constrained.

He began to admit to himself that he deserved his fate and his reputation for holding himself aloof. There would be one final attempt, however. Georgiana would be most disappointed if he were not to try.

He placed his long-empty glass on a table and moved towards where Elizabeth was standing with her younger sisters.

"Sir. Your urgent attention, sir."

Darcy turned. Bryant was standing behind him in full coat and riding gear, looking pale and unhappy. "What is it, man? Speak!"

Bryant swallowed and spoke hoarsely. "It is Miss Georgiana, sir. her carriage has been found. Empty, on the road to Pemberley."

"What?" Darcy's heart turns cold. "Who was with her? Where is she?"

"I don't know sir. The coachmen were found tied to a tree. They could not give any description of who attacked them. But Miss Georgiana was taken. Not harmed sir it seems but taken. I know not where."

Dracy clapped a hand to his mouth. "I must go."

He whirled round wildly, looking for Bingley. "I must tell Bingley - apologies -" But Bingley was nowhere to be seen.

And then Elizabeth was at Darcy's side, her skirts gathered in one hand, eyes alert. "What trouble is this, what is amiss?"

"My sister," said Darcy. His voice sounded strange and broken to his ears. "She has been kidnapped."

Elizabeth stared. Then she collected herself. "Come out into the passage. You will want a horse, and riding gear." She called for a servant. "Bring a riding cloak and sundries for Mr Darcy. This instant!"

"I have your horse, sir," said Bryant. "He is outside, tethered to mine."

Darcy nodded. He barely trusted himself to speak.

Elizabeth heard the rest of the tale as she organised proper boots and cloak for Darcy. There was not much to hear.

"Can I help?" she asked Darcy at the end, speaking low and gazing steadily up into his face. "You have only to ask me."

It was not how he had imagined the evening. But was enough to make hope leap in his chest. "Yes," he said. The impropriety could be considered later. "I am asking you."

She smiles briefly. "Then wait while I fetch my cloak."

They will be seen, they will be known, leaving the ball together on horseback. Darcy shakes his head.

"I will join you at the southern edge of Pemberley's new wilderness," she says. "Go."

Darcy thinks of Georgiana. They must pursue.

He nods at Elizabeth and murmurs, "Thank you."


	18. Chapter 18

Darcy was in the saddle, his hands on the reins, when Bingley appeared. "Darcy! What madness is this? You must not pursue your sister alone. Come down, man, wait five minutes, we will all join you."

Bingley, blessed Bingley, had mustered the men of the household, old and young alike, and all were ready at the front of the house. The liveried servants had abandoned the refreshments table and brought torches.

"I will be faster alone," Darcy said, pressing his friend's glove.

"Nonsense," said Bingley. "You will be more vulnerable alone, and you will cover a narrower span alone. Come on, man! Think sensibly."

These words, from Bingley's lips, made Darcy emit a painful laugh. "Very well, but be quick. All men who wish to help must be ready in three minutes."

The stables were emptied, more nags and hacks pressed into service, and soon a large group, ready with pistols and lanterns, was trotting towards the Pemberley road.

Darcy looked around. Had Elizabeth heard the change to their plans? He would take a detour around the wilderness at Pemberley to collect her. He spoke this to Bingley, without mentioning Elizabeth specifically, and Bingley swung his horse around to go himself but then Darcy's horse whinnied at another joining close by, and Darcy heard Elizabeth's voice.

"Mr Darcy. We are here. Do not turn back."

She was beside him on a fine black horse, not one he knew, and she was smiling anxiously under her hood. He nodded, and gestured to Bingley to stay.

Then Darcy saw other horses, smaller than Elizabeth's, following close behind. Mounted on these were two boys. Darcy glanced at Elizabeth and she nodded. Mary and Kitty.

"Don't worry, Mr Darcy," said Kitty. "We are not afraid, and we are armed."

"It is scandalous for you to be here," Darcy told them. "But I imagine it is pointless for me to tell you that."

"Yes!" they chorused.

"I must ride ahead," he said. "Stay with the men. Where is Mr Collins?"

"He is towards the back," Elizabeth said. "He is not a good horseman."

"The stay with him and do not enter any part of the forest alone. I must ride."

Elizabeth stretched her hand out towards him and he paused in the act of urging his horse. "Mr Darcy," she said. "This was my engagement gift from my father." She pats her horse's neck. "I think he will outrun yours."

"No," says Darcy, but his heart was saying Yes.

She smiled, pressed her heels into her horse, and they rode.

The clearing where Bryant found the empty coach gave no indication of the direction in which Georgiana has been taken. Darcy expected no more: Bryant would have found any obvious signs.

Darcy beckoned the search party onwards, and as they followed the road, the moon emerged from behind its clouds. Darcy looked across the fields where lush grass should be cradling sheep in their night's rest - and saw instead a great swathe cut across the nearest field - track marks, skid marks, flattened grass and damaged hedgerows.

"Gypsies," said Darcy. He had seen this damage before on his own land. The better sort of Romany came in family groups, and sought work at the house; the worst kind set camp wherever they would and stole their living from the fields and farms of respectable people.

Bingley looked in the direction of the swathe. "They make for Crookside," he said.

"A largish place," said Darcy. "It is the market there tomorrow. The minor fair that follows the great one at Nottingham.

"Mr Darcy," breathed Elizabeth, hiding her words from the men nearby. "Do you recall the event for which the goose fairs are famed?"

"Yes," he said shortly.

She obliged him with her eyes to say the words.

"Wife trading," he said.

* * *

The party followed the trail left by the gypsy wagons. Bryant, walking his horse, estimated three wagons, some horses besides, and two carts, heavily loaded. "They go to the market, sir," he said. "Though why they travel so late is a mystery."

"The night covers their nefarious act," said Darcy.

"We do not know that Georgiana is with them," Elizabeth reminded him. Bryant moved discreetly away, affecting not to notice the presence of a lady among the pursuers. "It may be pure coincidence that we have found their trail close to the place of her kidnap."

"Coincidences speak volumes," said Darcy.

"We are not well armed," she said then.

"Well enough," Darcy replied.

"It would be more prudent to negotiate," she said. "While they have Georgiana she is in danger. If we burst upon them with threats –"

Darcy turned his face from her and spurred his horse ahead.

This was madness. This hunt, at night, with women in the party, had he lost his senses so utterly as to allow this? Bingley had organised this, the men, whilst Darcy stumbled about in distress. Elizabeth was correct in her assessment, too: there must be no violence whilst Georgiana is in the hands of her kidnappers.

Had love turned his mind?

He allowed her horse to catch up with his once more. She sat strong and patient in the saddle. "You must turn back," he told her. "There is too much danger here. And if the disgraceful trade in women is truly the kidnappers' aim, then there must be no ladies within our party as we draw close."

She started to reply but was halted by a cry. The gypsy camp was ahead.

* * *

Three covered wagons were set against the dry stone wall of the field, close to the gate. There was a fire, and men and women in rough dress sat around it. Horses cropped the grass nearby.

All looked up at the search party cantered towards them.

Darcy sprang down. "I seek a young lady taken this night from her carriage as she travelled home. Where is she?"

The women smiled and glanced at the men. One man, a bearded fellow in a waistcoat and breeches, stood and approached Darcy, who had not dismounted. "What makes you say she is here?" he asked, in a mild tone.

"Your trail begins at the spot she was taken," Darcy said.

The man shrugged. "She is not here."

The women laughed.

"I do not believe you," said Darcy.

The man stared at Darcy.

"There may be gold in it for you if you can assist," Bingley said then. Darcy frowned at him but he went on. "Perhaps you witnessed this kidnap. Perhaps it is nothing to do with you, but you can direct us to the persons who have kidnapped this young lady." Bingley patted his coat pocket suggestively.

The gypsy leader took out a clay pipe from his waistcoat pocket, and began pressing tobacco into it with his thumb. "I may have seen something," he said. "Some activity."

"Tell us," demanded Darcy.

"My brother," said the man. "I might have seen my brother in company with a young woman-"

Elizabeth reached her hand towards Darcy's arm to stay him, at this casual disrespect to his sister.

"He might have gone with her into town," said the man. "But a gold coin would help my memory become clear."

Bingley handed over a very small coin immediately.

"Now I recall," said the gypsy, pocketing the coin. "My brother is a man of few morals, sirs. He has taken the woman into Crookside to meet with a certain fellow who will take care of her after that. This fellow sometimes asks us to bring him girls."

Bingley held out another coin.

"The name of this man," said Darcy.

The gypsy glanced about.

"The name!" growled Darcy.

"I don't know his name," said the gypsy. "But he is well known among the folk who travel with the fair. Ask for the one who runs the auction and you will find him."

"What auction," Bingley asked, tossing the coin across the to gypsy.

"The wife auction," he said.

The searchers prepared to move on. Darcy turned back and spoke witheringly to the gypsy leader. "You would sell your brother for two coins?" he asked. "You have fewer morals even than I imagined. I should have you all arrested and put in irons for your parts in this."

The man shrugged. "Your current company could not take us, sir, made up as it is of well fed gentlemen and raw boys. By the time men could come, we would be gone. Better to save yourselves the trouble. You have your information, I have my reward and the matter is done."

"Come Darcy," said Bingley. "Let us ride. This next field is mere rough ground but if we cross it, the road lies beyond."

Darcy glared at the gypsy man but obeyed Bingley. He looked around to be sure that Elizabeth was beside him, and her sisters safe at the back of the group with Collins.

They entered the stony pasture, aiming for the road.

* * *

The group picked its way over the moor in the dark, lanterns swinging in the hands of the searchers as moonlight came and vanished among the clouds overhead. The faint glow was enough for the horses; their riders needs must trust their mount' better sight.

"This is too dangerous," said Bingley. "These horses, these men, are not made for this." He gave a rueful laugh and indicated the fine waistcoat beneath his riding coat.. "I am not made for this."

"Then turn back," said Darcy, but the words were too harsh and he threw his head towards Bingley in apology. "I am sorry. I forget that not all feel this as urgently as I."

"I feel it."says Bingley. "I need only think of the pain were it my own dear sister."

They walk their horses side by side.

"I know I am not the bold friend you need at such a time," said Bingley of a sudden. "But I hope I can be of some help to you all the same."

Darcy was amazed. "You are all the friend I ever asked," he said, "and more."

Bingley gave a sigh. "You will not marry my sister, though," he said.

Elizabeth was nearby. Darcy edged his mount a little further from her hearing.

"No," said Darcy. "It is no reflection on the lady," he added. "Your sister is as beautiful and accomplished as you told me."

"Then may I ask what prevents you?" said Bingley. "She is a good match, I hope you'll agree."

"The fault is my own," said Darcy. He hesitated to speak but shook off his wariness. There was more at stake tonight than his habitual reserve. Bingley deserved the truth, and Elizabeth had already had it of Darcy, in his kisses on her wrist and his pleading eyes. "There is another," said Darcy.

Bingley is astonished. "Darcy, you sly dog. You must tell me who. A Bennett, it must be one of the Bennett ladies, although I am to wed the most beautiful."

Darcy remained silent.

"Mary," puzzled Bingley. "Not Kitty? I am confounded."

"Your fiancee's youngest sisters are safe from my attentions," said Darcy.

"Then who? Some lady from town, perhaps, a secret correspondent with whom you have formed an engagement..."

"Bingley, your romantic soul has bested you. I am not secretly betrothed to anyone." Darcy leaned how over his horse's neck, encouraging it in the uncertain darkness.

"Yet you love this lady. Why have you not yet acted? I have never known you hesitate, in any thing." Bingley's voice showed bewilderment.

Darcy did not speak. The horses picked their way across stones, small streams. Where was the road?

"It is not like you to remain passive," Bingley remarked. "Tell me, Darcy. You must have a reason, and if it is an area where I might offer help or advice-"

"I thank you, but you cannot," Darcy said. "And I cannot ask for the lady's hand or I would do it this moment. -She is engaged to another man."

He had spoken it, in her hearing. Yet he did not feel the awkwardness he expected. He felt, rather, improved. Honesty was the solution. His best moments were his most honest. He thought of Elizabeth's glove again and his lips on that silk, her warm wrist beneath. And now she rode near to him again, unknown to any there but him.

"I am sorry," Bingley said then. "I have known the pain of a broken heart and I would wish it upon no one."

"My heart must recover as best it can," said Darcy.

"Do I know this lady?" Bingley asked suspiciously.

Elizabeth coughed gruffly beside them.

"I cannot say," said Darcy.

"Does she know of your love? What lady could choose another over you?"

"Your loyalty is touching," said Darcy. "But this lady is well able to see my many flaws. And she has chosen for reasons most private to herself and her family, who she holds dearer than her own heart."

It was true. He had to admire her in this even as it contravened his own desires.

"So she knows, but rejects you?" Bingley's voice in the dark revealed his astonishment.

"She does. She must. I have been most ..." He groped for a word. Unsubtle, he thought. He had all but begged for love as her fiancé stood by. "Clear," he said.

"I confess I do not understand it," says Bingley. "If your person and manner were insufficiently pleasing then your wealth –"

"This lady has no interest in my wealth." He was sure of that now. She had never sought his attention, never flirted as others had, never flattered or courted him. Her every dealing with him had been straightforward and honest. She had teased him, to be sure, but it had not been a sign of her affection for him as an acquaintance, a fellow conspirator, perhaps a friend.

He tired of the discussion. It was to no purpose, and there was work to be done. "Come," Darcy said. "We must move on, we are making no progress." Crookside was still some way off and this moorland was treacherous. The sooner they reached the road at its far edge the better. It was looking likely that the party must rest at Crookside, and the ladies must be accommodated, and how was that to be achieved? Bingley, Darcy thought. Bingley must take his future sisters under his care. There would be a shock, but Bingley had shown mettle tonight, and Darcy hoped that Bingley would shoulder the knowledge of the Bennett ladies' wilder tendencies with equanimity.

Darcy pressed his horse ahead, intending to find the road.

A commotion and cry from the back of the search party halted him.

Darcy turned back, rode through the group. There was a scream, a very feminine scream, and then another.

A horse had fallen. It lay, whinnying piteously and struggling to rise. Darcy sprang down, fearing for Kitty, for Mary. The rider was underneath the beast.

Darcy dragged the rider out from under the horse as others held lanterns and coaxed the animal to its feet. He let out his pent breath in guilty relief, for the injured rider was not one of the young ladies, but Collins, who lay now in a faint, his right leg at an unnatural angle. There was no blood and Darcy would have hoped for no more than bruising but for that odd twist.

Light was cast onto Collin's unconscious face. "He has cracked his head," said Darcy. "And I fear his ankle may be broken." Darcy stood and soothed the frightened horse. It was uninjured - a mere mis-step ha thrown its rider.

Elizabeth appeared beside Darcy, her hood about her face. She placed her hand on the shivering horse beside Darcy's own. Lantern light flickered across her skin. "I cannot hide if I am to help," she whispered. "My sisters and I know how to tend injuries." She paused, her hand moving over the horse's neck in rhythmic patterns of comfort. "Jane and I set Kitty's ankle once, in the woods. It was good as new in two months."

Darcy hesitated. "I must continue the hunt," he said. "I – My situation is desperate," he said.

She put her gloved fingers over his on the horse's neck. He feels a tremor in her touch, and the horse's panting breaths coming through both their hands. "Yes," said Elizabeth. "You must hunt, and I must help Mr Collins."

She threw back her hood, stepping into the light around the prostrate Collins. "Kitty, Mary," she called in a clear voice, and the company of men gasped and exclaimed as she was revealed a woman. "Come and help me with Mr Collins."

"Miss Bennett!" cried Bingley. "What do you do here? And your sisters-?" He was gaping and stammering.

"We felt the plight of Miss Darcy too deeply to remain at home," said Elizabeth quickly. "Mr Collins is our guardian, of course." She knelt beside Collins as she spoke, joined by Mary and Kitty.

Bingley stood stunned.

Darcy bent to give Elizabeth his handkerchief, as if this might assist. "I wish to ride on," he said in a low voice. "Crookside is but a mile away, if we can find the road. Stay with Bingley and make for the town. I will search for my sister with Bryant."

"We must bring Mr Collins to a house," Elizabeth said. "It does not appear to be a serious fall, but a doctor should see his leg, and examine his head with better knowledge than mine."

"There is an inn at Crookside . No doubt we will all end there this evening."

She looked into his eyes at this. "You are thinking of my reputation again," she said. She laughed hollowly. "My reputation is a little tarnished these days. I insist upon staying at inns with gentlemen I am not married to and am now also in the habit of riding out with them at hours when every young lady ought to be abed. I am ruined already, Mr Darcy. I have been ruined since before you and I met, and I can only marvel that you persist in our acquaintance."

"No," Darcy protested.

"And since we met I have often regretted my mistakes," she added.

He was not sure what she meant by this and there was no time to consider it. "Stay with the gentlemen," he repeated.

"I would rather ride with you," she said. "My wish to find Georgiana is as strong as your own, for she is young and has done nothing to bring this on herself."

Before Darcy could deny her this request, a cry hails them from some way off.

Bingley lifts a lantern.

Darcy stands, as does Elizabeth, leaving Collins in the hands of the younger Misses Bennett. "The road," Darcy said. "At last."

A coach, hung with lanterns, was visible on the road, a tall man on the box.

"Darcy," cried this man, and his voice was brisk and capable.

"Thank God," said Darcy. "It is Fitzwilliam."


	19. Chapter 19

It was a trial to settle everyone at the respectable Crown Inn at Crookside. Yet at last it was done: the ladies all in bed, and a sensible woman sitting with them; the doctor called to Collins and then Bingley most generously choosing to sit in that chamber with the injured parson, and a small bottle of brandy, until he should sleep; and Darcy at last in the small downstairs snug with Fitzwilliam, deciding upon their plan.

The trading floor had been discovered as occupying on occasions the back room of a tavern at the far end of Crookside - a tavern Darcy had only ever passed, it not having the aspect which might tempt a gentleman inside. At this low place, then, wives were to be sold and bought, in common with the material goods they might hold as their own at the time of the end of their marriage - such being thrown in as an added propulsion to the sale, should the charms of the lady in question prove an insufficient inducement to the purchaser.

And to this place, therefore, they must assume Georgiana had been brought, in what state Darcy was by now desperate to discover.

"Fitzwilliam. You must be my lieutenant in this," Darcy said, his foot upon the fender. The embers in the grate still glowed, though the hour, by now was late indeed. "I depend on you, Fitzwilliam, to get Georgiana back if I should fail."

"Have no doubt of it," Fitzwilliam returned. "Only let me see the face of the men who took her, and I will readily -"

The door of the snug opened at that moment and Elizabeth walked in. Darcy noted at once that she wore her bonnet and coat. The bonnet was a little strange - a mob cap such as Mrs Bennett wore. And the coat, indeed, was not Elizabeth's usual demure habit, but something plain and coarse, quite coarse. "What do you do downstairs?" he asked, moving to close the door, that nobody from the inn should see her joining them here at so late an hour.

"I am come to help," Elizabeth replied steadily. She came near to their chairs by the low burning fire, and laid her gloved hand on the table where the brandy and glasses stood. "I am as nearly involved in this as anyone. Please do not punish me by insisting that I remain behind."

She sat in the chair hastily drawn up by Fitzwilliam. "When are we to visit this other inn and break in upon the thieves?" she asked briskly.

"This moment," said Darcy. "You catch us as we are on the point of departing."

"What reason will you give? With two of you it can hardly be a daring raid." Elizabeth looked questioningly at Darcy, and it was clear that she had given the matter as much thought as he. A year ago, a woman of such strong, such free opinions as hers might have been repugnant to him; now he was grateful for this alternative viewpoint.

He strove to reply. "Much as it disturbs me, I intend to purchase my sister. The full weight of the law will have to wait. I cannot allow Georgiana to remain another moment in their grasp while the magistrate trundles across the country."

"I will remain to haggle over the amount," Fitzwilliam added, "while Darcy secures the young lady."

Elizabeth considered these ideas. Then she shook her head. "It is insufficient. A further distraction is needed if you are to spirit her away - for I surmise that you do not have money about you to purchase a wife outright, and would need to put up some collateral in order to secure your purchase..."

"My watch," admitted Darcy. "It is a fine specimen but not so dear as my sister."

Elizabeth looked at her hands in her lap, the picture of modest femininity. Then she raised her head and spoke in the clear tone Darcy had come to expect from her. "I suggest another bargain. A true wife trade." She stood and slowly turned about as if showing off her gown.

The realisation of her proposal burst in upon the men. Both gasped and exclaimed in shocked tones. "No!" cried Darcy.

"Yes," Elizabeth replied firmly. Fitzwilliam looked from her to Darcy, puzzled by their easy manner of addressing each other.

"You are clearly a gentlewoman." Darcy cast his hand wide to encompass the obvious merits of Miss Bennett.

She was not bowed. "Then I hope I may fetch a high price."

There was no persuading her and so Darcy, with forbidding looks at the puzzled Fitzwilliam, agreed to this altered plan. Elizabeth posing as the unwanted wife of Darcy, was to provide the added distraction. She would also be likely to be taken to join Georgiana whilst awaiting sale, "A further advantage," Elizabeth said, "as it will allow me to advise her of her rescue ahead of the event itself."

The plan was to be executed at once. The more time lost, the farther Georgiana might be from their reach. Darcy and Fitzwilliam took up their hats and coats, and concealed about their persons what small items might in necessity, be employed as weapons - principally their riding crops, for they had come away from home prepared for a ball, not a battle.

They slipped out of the door of the Crown, and into the flagged market square of Crookside, the night now lit by a near-full moon and flavoured with all the midnight scents of a small town in late summer.

Fitzwilliam essayed ahead, following the direction to the tavern given by staff at the Crown. Darcy and Elizabeth walked a little behind, careful of wagon ruts in the dry mud on the streets, so dark as it was.

"How strange!" Elizabeth remarked as they progressed toward the tavern. "That I am to be Mrs Darcy, albeit for such a brief time."

"Not Mrs Darcy," he reminded her. "We must not use our true names."

"Of course," she said, dipping her head. "To be Mrs Darcy - impossible thought."

It was not so wild as all that, Darcy reflected, but kept quiet. This was not the moment for any such flirtation with what might have been. "We shall be Mr and Mrs Smith," he said.

"As you say."

He stopped, and so did she, Fitzwilliam continuing on ahead. Her sad acceptance of a fate he knew - he believed - could never bring her happiness, cut him to the quick. Collins was so unsuitable to her quick wit and spirited nature, that even if he himself were to remain unsuccessful, he could not allow her to throw herself away. Better to see her married to Fitzwilliam than this! "Elizabeth - Miss Bennett -"

She waited, her eyes dark upon him.

"Your shawl and bonnet," he said. His earlier impulse was now back under his control. "They are tied with too much care. Allow me to -"

He tugged a little at the ribbons of her cap - borrowed, Elizabeth had confessed, from a married servant at the Crown, attempting to lend her a less reputable air. Elizabeth stayed Darcy's hands with her own, and disarrayed the cap herself, and set her shawl to a more careless arrangement.

"There," she said. "Do I now look as dissolute as you hoped?"

She smiled, but he could hear her nerves in her unsteady voice. "Never," he said.

"Then you must hope for a great deal of untidiness, for I look quite the fright."

He started to say that this had not been his meaning, and then caught her teasing look.

"Come," she said. "Colonel Fitzwilliam is at the very door of this wife trading place. Let us go in."

Darcy offered her his arm. "You ought to appear sullen and dull," he whispered as they entered the back door of the shabby tavern, disturbing several thin fowl as they stepped in.

"And you ought to appear far less solicitous of me," she retorted. "Make yourself seem eager to be rid of me."

The tavern was crowded, and it seemed that as many spectators, come to peer at the transactions, filled the space with bustle and noise, as men in want of a wife or in excess of one.

Darcy found the man overseeing the trades - an ill favoured fellow with dirty cheeks and many signs about him of the long habit of drink. He explained his wish to sell, as briefly as he could, and indicated Elizabeth with an offhand gesture.

The scoundrel's eyes lit up. "We take a portion of the selling price for our trouble," he said, his gaze roving over Miss Bennett's person in a foul and lascivious tour.

Darcy felt Fitzwilliam's hand on his arm. Just as well, for in another instant the trader would have found himself among the dust and straw with Darcy's boot at his throat.

"I wish a replacement also," Darcy said then, as calmly as he could manage. "Something else in the gentlewomanly line. I want none of your farmers' wives."

He kept his expression aloof as his eye travelled along the line of women for sale - downcast, and some shivering with sobs, they were a pitiable sight. Darcy saw Elizabeth's horror as she was drawn to join that evil queue. And then - at the end, cowering between two coarser girls, Darcy glimpsed his sister's pale and tear-streaked face.

"That's a good one," he said with as much nonchalance as he imagined would be shown by the kind of man who could buy and sell a female. "I'll have her. Name your price."

Georgiana lifted her head at the sound of his voice. Elizabeth moved to stand beside her, and whispered, and Georgiana instantly guarded her hopeful expression.

"Be not too eager," said Fitzwilliam boldly. "Let us have a closer inspection of the -" His natural gallantry stumbled over the next word - "item."

The wife trader jerked his thumb at Georgiana and she stepped forward.

"I am a better judge of price than you," Fitzwilliam said then to Darcy. "Say your goodbyes to your previous lady, and I will examine your new."

Darcy grasped his meaning at once, and stepping forward, took Elizabeth's hands. "Make ready to run," he murmured. "These rogues are undoubtedly armed."

"What, leave these other women to their fates? Most do not part willingly from their husbands." Elizabeth pointed to the other women offered for sale. "And how many of these here may have been procured in such a manner as your sister?"

"How can we free them?" Darcy hissed. "Fitzwilliam has monies for Georgiana, no more."

They glanced at where Fitzwilliam, now holding Georgiana's elbow with plausible possessiveness, was shaking hands with the dirty faced wife trader.

"I do not propose you buy them," Elizabeth said scornfully. She turned to her compatriots, saying, "Any who would escape this despicable place, follow me at my signal."

"Elizabeth - you place yourself in peril," urged Darcy in a whisper. He calculated the distance to the door, the number of women to escort, the number of men who might oppose them. "We would have not a chance. These fellows are armed -"

"As am I," said Elizabeth, and drawing a pistol from beneath her shawl, stepped forward and fired an echoing shot into the rafters.


End file.
